For cancer patients, it helps to be married. A statistical study of 750,000 patients reported in the Journal of Clinical Oncology showed that marriage made almost as big a difference in survival as chemotherapy. Over five years, those who were married were 20 percent more likely to be alive at any stage of the disease. They were also 50 percent more likely to get the best care. But that change in the odds can come at a huge cost to the spouse, who is largely invisible and taken for granted by the cancer care system.
The role of the spouse is particularly obvious with women’s breast cancer. It’s a disaster for the woman who receives the diagnosis. She’s facing chemo, radiation, surgery, and the emotional challenges of the existential threat to her life. But as a researcher has remarked, “Breast cancer is a disease of couples.” The male partner’s world is turned upside down, too.
As a breast cancer husband, I’ve seen and experienced what happens when men are plunged into the caregiver role. When all this happened to me, I knew there was a lot to do, and it was important for me to do it, but I didn’t know what or how or when. I looked around for support and found precious little. I’m pretty sure I had what one of our doctors calls the “deer in the headlights” stare.