Pre-memorializing

[Michelle]

When you are facing the possibility of imminent death, people treat you differently,” Suleika writes. “All of this attention can feel like
you are being memorialized while you are still alive.” What was it like for Suleika to be mourned like this before she was gone? Do you
fault her friends and family for acting this way, or do you think it’s a human impulse? How, if at all, does Suleika try to avoid this trap of
pre-memorializing with her group of cancer friends?

[Aly]

I think this situation is difficult for the cancer patient, family, and friends. I know she discusses how her family was memorializing her while she was still alive but I feel like she does this too. I know she does want to live and continue forward but at some points, it feels as if she is prepping for death herself.
When it comes to her family, I do not think they were in the wrong. They were prepared with a 35% survival rate and they feared the worst. At that moment they probably thought that they underappreciated previous times with Suleika and wanted to no longer make that mistake. I can understand how that hurts Suleika but there has to be some empathy extended to her family and friends at that time as well. Also, I 100% believe that is a human impulse, throughout time we meander around, and then all of the sudden we are given a ticking clock, and we panic. It happens often in situations involving death but also in other situations.

I think when she meets her friends this is her escape, this is the first time cancer surrounds them all but it is not a suffocating topic. Her friends and she were able to take the situation that they all understood well and work with it while not letting it run their lives. They were able to keep their cancer as something casual which helped all of them.