Michael Vagg, the Clinical Senior Lecturer at Deakin University School of Medicine & Pain Specialist at Barwon Health, Australia has published a thoughtful piece in The Conversation:
theconversation.com/mondays...
He concludes:
"If faced with a serious illness, you’re likely to have a better quality of life if you have good social supports and avoid giving in to complete pessimism. Nobody can tell you the perfect formula to deal with the impact of a serious diagnosis.
But don’t believe those who tell you your illness is your fault somehow, or that you wouldn’t have it if you’d somehow been a better person.
You don’t need to feel that you should be completely positive 100% of the time, because not only does that not happen, it’s not healthy either. Coping the best way you know how to is all you should be aiming to do."
Neil