Robin Zimmerman is a retired baker living in the Willamette Valley. In 2008, his wife lost her life at the age of 48 after a four-year struggle with melanoma, leaving behind an adult son and preteen daughter. Five years later, he had an early-stage melanoma diagnosed and removed. He now divides his time working part-time at a hospital and as a skin cancer advocate volunteering with multiple organizations.

Robin Zimmerman

I was raised with two parents and three siblings in a blue-collar neighborhood. My father was not educated beyond eighth grade and my mother finished high school. My oldest sibling was the only one of us to attend college.

I acquired a work ethic by witnessing my parents’ actions in life. If there is a problem, fix it. If you don’t know how to fix it, learn how. The cost of a repairman was beyond our families reach so this was a fact of life. My father demonstrated that a job done well is satisfaction enough. There was no need for praise or even a thank you for doing what was necessary or for just helping someone out. I was required to purchase my first car and have my own money for insurance before my father would teach me to drive. We found a Plymouth Valiant with a damaged front fender in a used car lot. With help from my father, a trip to the wrecking yard, a weekend of work and the car was good as new.

I recently read “A Man Called Ove” and watched the movie “A Man Called Otto,” based on the book. The bookwas much more detailed about Ove’s life and ethics, and these were very similar to mine. When Ove’s/Otto’s wife was injured, he remodeled the kitchen to align with her wheelchair-bound needs. When a wheelchair became a necessity for my wife, I went to work building a ramp on our steps. He cared for his wife with empathy and compassion the way only a man completely in love can do. I recognized myself in those actions.

Ove/Otto’s grief over his wife’s death was profound.

I had a feeling of kinship with this character,but at that point we diverged. He had no children. He had recently been forced into retirement. So, the void left by his wife’s death was exponentially increased. In my case I had an adult son to share with and a preteen daughter to care for. I had a job that still filled a large portion of my life, and it was a necessity to support myself and my daughter. I took a proactive approach to grief. I sought counseling for myself. A priority for me became self-educating on grief, especially its effect on a teen girl losing a mother. I did not have a void. I had the opposite: a defined purpose.

It has been 15 years since my wife’s passing and my son is now married with two children. My daughter was married just under a year ago. I may be alone, but I do have a purpose. Not long after my wife’s passing, my daughter was in high school and I decided a change in family leave law was needed. I was not able to access my sick pay to support my time off after her death and I saw a need to fix this. It took three years of work to pass that legislation.

Awareness of melanoma was limited, and volunteers were needed to help raise funds and spread the word. Continuing education, involvement and taking on more responsibilities in that capacity has filled my life. I speak at events on occasion, but I am more content working in the background.

“A job well done is satisfaction enough.”

Whether through chance or divine intervention Ove/Otto found purpose and it saved his life. As we face losses, successes, life in general, it is important to take a step back and examine oneself. What is my purpose? What gives my life meaning? Not the key to a long life, but probably what is needed for a happy one, is finding that purpose and being satisfied with what is accomplished with no need “for praise or even a thank you”. I believe that it is a beautiful thing to be “Burdened With Glorious Purpose”.

WARNING: “A Man Called Ove”/”A Man Called Otto” does deal with the subject of suicide.

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I felt a kinship with the main character in the book, “A Man Called Ove,” though luckily, I had a purpose after my wife died of melanoma, and that helped to keep me going.  

Glorious Purpose After Cancer

We do everything we can to save a loved one, but too often it is just not enough. So it was with my wife, and so it will be for many others to come. When we reach that point, the best we can do is to make that passing as gentle, peaceful and painless as possible.

Before I speak about my wife, I want to jump back to August of 2004 and to what I learned with my father’s passing. He was 82 years old and had lung issues. After my mother passed away, we moved my father into our home. He was with us about two years when he developed a blockage in his kidney. The doctors explained that this would take his life if not surgically removed. But there was a problem: His lungs were not healthy enough for him to survive the anesthesia. He had the option of death by inaction or death by surgery. Surgery was what was then the only choice.

I sat with him and talked before he went into surgery. Fully aware that we would not see each other again, he was able to reassure me that he was OK with his time with us coming to an end. There was nothing left for him in this world he felt he needed to do. After the surgery, he did survive for some time but in a coma. He was still alive but fading. This took a couple of days and there was no noticeable discomfort.

When the end was near, the hospital contacted us (my wife, our children and myself) and were beside his bed. We could see him start to struggle. I leaned close and said, “It’s OK, we will be fine.” And with that he relaxed and passed in peace. It was surreal watching this scene play out on the big screen in a Marvel movie with the death of Ironman. I have to say, they got it right.

We now go to two weeks after my father’s passing and my wife getting diagnosed with melanoma. There was no expectation of her death at this point. First: “It was only skin cancer.” And second: “We got it all.” Of course, neither of these statements were true. Four years pass to the first week of May in 2008. The doctors have told us they have done all they can. The hospital arranged for hospice to come to our house. We brought Bonnie home and got her into her bed until the hospice bed and nurse arrived so Bonnie can be transferred. We were both relieved that the end was going to happen at home and not in a medical facility. As it happens Bonnie has two sisters that are RNs and were there for us as well. It was a warm day, so the windows were open and fresh air blew through the house. Bonnie especially loved camping and the campfire. I went out to the firepit in the backyard and started a small campfire and allowed the scent to fill the house. Of course, we had no idea how long this process would take but between the advice from the hospice nurse and the knowledge of Bonnie’s sisters, we knew what to watch for.

We had a short time to converse before her mind became more and more detached from the world around us. In that short time, regardless of whether I felt it was the truth or not, I assured her we would be OK. Saying this felt surreal as I was facing becoming a single parent to a 12-year-old daughter. Our other child, our son, was 22 and getting ready to marry and had a very supportive fiancé so I was confident of his support. Friends and family came by that afternoon and early evening. Sometimes she was aware, sometimes not. That night our daughter and I laid down to get some sleep expecting to repeat this process in the morning. Come 3 am, we were awakened with the end imminent. We were able to give a last goodbye and reassurance of, “We would be fine.”

When all is said and done what is important to me was that we did all we could to save her. And when that failed, we did all we could to make her passing as peaceful as possible.

How I Helped My Wife Die Peacefully

Whether in treatment, a survivor or a caregiver, the experience of dealing with cancer becomes ingrained in our psyche. We experience the first diagnosis. Then comes the discussion of treatment options, their risks and side effects and of concern for possible outcomes. Life becomes a series of surgeries and treatments followed with healing periods.

These often weaken and limit our strength, leaving us with a lot of inactivity and solitude. Many treatments mean multiple visits taking multiple hours as the drugs received are slowly fed in through an IV. This period can settle in the subconscious, waiting to be triggered by the right image or phrase.

Through the 1950s, 60s and 70s cancer was not spoken about in mixed company. Often cancer was equated with a death sentence and referred to with code phrases such as “the C word.”

You did not see cancer displayed in popular media. Portrayals in movies or books were uncommon, if they existed at all, and usually carried a somber attitude. News stories were mostly just headlines, with a few sentences about the diagnosis or death of a notable person. This is understandable since the medical world's knowledge of cancer and successful treatments at that time were still limited. Survival was often considered a miracle.

Beginning in the 1980s breast cancer was the first with a major public campaign. Self-exams were recommended with advertising and instructions on how had become mainstream. The idea of a baseline mammogram was added to the standard of care. Improvements on all fronts from early detection to treatment were improving outcomes.

Over the decades, this same process has been adapted to all other cancers. It was now not just safe, but common, to talk about cancer out in the open. Now cancer is often talked about in movies and TV shows, and is often an integral part of the story.

It is 2014, my daughter and I are sitting in the movie theater waiting for the new Marvel movie, “Guardians of the Galaxy” to begin. It opens with a 10-year-old boy in a hospital, standing beside a hospice bed, his uncle beside him as his mother is experiencing the last few moments of life.

I have a flashback to six years prior, and it is me standing with my 12-year-old daughter beside a hospice bed as her mother is experiencing the last few moments of her life. I can only imagine what my daughter is feeling.

Fortunately, the theater is dark, and everyone is glued to the screen. Thankfully during the six years before this, both my daughter and I have actively been counseled on our grief and that flashback did not last much longer than the movie scene and we were able to enjoy the rest of the film.

Then recently a movie scene hit me. Again, a Marvel movie, it has the character Jane Foster in cancer care sitting in the chair, IV beside her, and support person keeping her company.

I remember how at those times in my life the focus was always about being positive. Regardless of how my wife felt, the response to “How are you doing?” was “fine,” just as the movie's character Jane Foster replied — the old “Fake it till you make it” strategy.

Lights, Camera, Cancer: A Look at How the Disease Is Portrayed in the Media

As often as cancer now shows up in storylines now, this type of experience will continue to happen to everyone and all we can do is accept and let it flow past “Like a bridge over troubled water.”

Cancer is now in the news daily. Often it is a story about a new treatment or a story of a miraculous survival. People openly interview about their struggles. This is a great accomplishment, because it is no longer a taboo subject. Earlier diagnosis, knowledge of available treatments, access to clinical trials and the connections to support groups have all increased exponentially.

I cannot give much advice on treating PTSD other than my own experience and what has helped me. Seeking counseling during and after treatment for both my wife (patient) and myself (caregiver) and our children has made our PTSD more manageable.

Cancer is talked about more openly nowadays, and while watching a movie with my daughter, a scene portraying a character in hospice care gave me flashbacks to our cancer experience.

A Superhero Movie Triggered My Cancer-Related PTSD

When facing a hardship like a cancer diagnosis, or in my case losing someone to cancer, we must deal with the reactions from everyone we confide in.

Empathy and sympathy are emotions that are tied together and share similar aspects but have very different effects on those around us. The official definition for empathy is, “The ability to understand and share the feelings of another.” Empathy is a proactive reaction.

The official definition for sympathy is, “A feeling of pity and sorrow for someone else's misfortune.” Sympathy is a passive reaction. It does not initiate a proactive response, but is more commonly held internally by the outside observer.

In my experience, the most common initial reaction to cancer is sympathy, which can have the effect of magnifying hardship, as the “pity” aspect is the hardest part to deal with. Often this reaction leaves people with a need to comfort, while triggering prior events and feelings. Fearing that reaction, I've learned to hide or edit my stories to prevent this issue.

My daughter lost her mother at the age of 12. She has been manipulating her story since high school. As she explains it, she just could not stand people looking at her like some “wounded puppy.” She became an expert at subtlety and avoidance when it came to the subject of mothers — she was not outright lying, just never mentioning anything about her mother unless directly asked. And when asked her answer was followed quickly with the statement that there is no reason to feel sorry for her as she has accepted and is dealing with her loss.

Empathy is a much more helpful reaction, though it can be difficult to feel or express. When a person expresses empathy, they help others to feel heard, valued and comforted. I’ve realized that this will happen a little easier had the person lived through a similar experience to ours. But even that is no guarantee that sympathy will not be the initial reaction.

All we can do is to have open and honest conversations about our feelings and try to lead interactions with others towards the empathy that can help. We must express that we carry a strength to get us through and their understanding will help us in that process.

Ultimately, we cannot control the way people feel or how they react in certain situations. It just becomes part of our process in dealing with day-to-day life. We develop ways to compensate.

Some will do as my daughter has and limit sharing to only those she trusts. Unfortunately, there are those of us that withdraw and will not share, thus missing out on the support they might have received.

Others will do as I am doing: become advocates and share our story to bring a greater value to what we have faced.

You’ve heard the story, but is it truth?

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I prefer when people respond with empathy when they hear about my wife’s death from cancer, though I’m often met with sympathy first.  

Robin Zimmerman

Glorious Purpose After Cancer

How I Helped My Wife Die Peacefully

A Superhero Movie Triggered My Cancer-Related PTSD

Dealing With People’s Reactions to Cancer: From Empathy to Sympathy

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