Deconstructing The Kennedy Coverage
May 22nd, 2008 by Editor
Jessie Gruman, PhD, who has personally survived four life-threatening diagnoses, is the author of AfterShock: What to do When the Doctor Gives You--or Someone You Love--a Devastating Diagnosis and President of the Center for the Advancement of Health and President of the Center for the Advancement of Health.
The talking heads have already buried Teddy Kennedy and are now delivering their eulogies.
While on one hand I’m offended by their prematurity – I mean, the guy doesn’t even know precisely what kind of tumor he has yet - - I recognize that this is what the media does. I’m really not that critical of all these proclamations of love and friendship and praise for his principled action. After all, it is characteristic of the media to shamelessly force to the surface the emotional drama that underlies an event. “Tell me, Mr. Adams – how did you feel when your child was burned up in that house fire?”
The media coverage of Senator Kennedy’s devastating diagnosis reminds me of two uncomfortable truths: First, that when someone we love receives such a diagnosis, we want to fix it, even though we know that our efforts cannot change the enormity of the facts. Most of us do this on a less grand scale than the public commentators. Sometimes we offer reassurance about the outcome – “I’m sure everything will be OK.” This is a risky strategy, since you have no reason to know whether it is true. Sometimes we propose to help – “Please let me know what I can do” – a reasonable strategy but only if you are willing to follow through on it. And sometimes we, too, praise the bravery and fighting spirit of the person, an approach that is often met by the patient with some skepticism, since bravery and hope and fighting spirit ebb and flow as they try to take in the full meaning of the bad news.
Our words are often all we have to offer someone who has just received a devastating diagnosis, and we extend them in the vain hope that they will soften the shock and the loss it implies, both to the patient and to ourselves.
The second uncomfortable truth is that the media’s response to Ted Kennedy’s diagnosis reminds us of is that despite the tremendous progress in understanding and treating cancer, despite the armies of cancer survivors who throng the streets on their charity runs, cancer is still a disease that kills many. A cancer diagnosis still strikes fear into our hearts and it does so for good reason.
More From Jessie Gruman, Ph.D.--
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