Mary Gunn - Well: A Doctors Journey Through Fear to Freedom

Well : a lined shaft sunk in the earth from which a supply of water is obtained

a source

good health or fortune

expressing surprise

The Chambers Dictionary,

Thirteenth Edition (2014)

My mother had a marvellous way of saying Well to the unexpected in life. She said it with emphasis, mildly raised eyebrows, and a tilt of the head. Part exclamation mark, part question mark. It wasnt what she said but the way she said it. In her mouth this slight, four-letter word could carry amusement, acceptance, shock, disapproval, dismay and the most tender sadness. In all its cadences it covered most things. I said it myself, often without realising, as I grew up. Every cell in my body said it when I was diagnosed with cancer aged forty-four. That particular Well had fifty wide-eyed exclamation marks and a hundred question marks after it. Odd to use a word denoting health when told of a serious diagnosis. Odder still, and immensely fortunate, to be well nearly twenty years later. And well has a third meaning: a channelling deep into the earth, a hard dug hole, a space through which we draw up the water we need to live. The small word well can also act as adverb; is well freighted with meaning. All manner of wells flow through this book.

How do we live well, and what do we need in order to live well? Adequate food, shelter and security are the basic requirements but how much is adequate and who decides what constitutes security? It all depends on our view. When I lived in Africa I discovered that very little was enough for living well. Watching a Malawian woman cook her familys daily meal in a clay pot resting on three stones surrounding a two-stick fire humbled my own (previously extensive) list of requirements for a good life. After three years I returned to Scotland and soon fell into wanting more. My eye was caught by the clothes in the shop windows, the larger houses in estate agents windows, better-paid posts in the jobs column on, on and out of sight. My view readjusted rapidly to that of an eager consumer in Western society. But at least I had learned that my view was flexible, if disappointingly chameleon. And I knew that I relished life more, felt much more carefree, when I wanted less.

When I was diagnosed with cancer my needs became focussed and simple again. I wanted to survive this illness and see my children grow up. I was lucky enough to do that. Then, thirteen years after my initial diagnosis, the cancer recurred. This time there was no talk of a cure. This lump behind my ribs could not be removed; it was too big, too central, had been silently growing for too long. Only palliative treatment was possible. I asked: How long? and was told two years at the most. Even that seemed optimistic after seeing the grapefruit-sized mass on the scan. Though outwardly calm, I was filled with fear. I felt as if I had a hand grenade inside my chest, deep in, close to my heart, lungs and gullet. How to live well with that ? If food, shelter and security are the basic requirements, I felt severely lacking in the third.

The fear that cancer sufferers and their families experience is similar to the overwhelming fear any of us experiences when, for whatever reason, our world suddenly becomes for us a deeply unsafe place; when the happy, secure future we had projected for ourselves and our children is suddenly wiped away. In todays world no one requires a diagnosis of cancer in order to experience deep anxiety and sustained fear. We only have to turn on our news channels. I write this in November 2016, in a world newly shocked by Trump coming to power in America; by the ongoing horror in Syria where years of unthinkable violence has emptied millions of people across the Mediterranean and into a reluctant and disunited Europe; by the unresolved plight of the Palestinian people; by the turmoil in Libya, Yemen and so many other countries. Our world is filled with conflict and fear.

We all yearn for ways to reduce our inner distress and alarm, whatever its cause. It is impossible to live well with chronic fear. It paralyses and debilitates. It is natural that we want either to get away from it or go to war with it. We see fight or flight as the only options. If we cannot flee from the external situation then we flee internally: we pretend it is not there, with the readily available help of Netflix, retail therapy, sunny holidays, drugs, alcohol (Ive tried them all). We put our fingers in our ears, we close our eyes and we watch a different internal movie.