Hi, is anyone watching Desperate Housewives? One of them (not half as desperate as me, I can tell you) is doing chemo. How do you think it is being portrayed? Realistic? I was OK with it until last night - even with the cannabis cookies episode last week which was far fetched and a bit silly but not offensive. But the whole idea of the wig being a fantasy sex aid thing was a bit OTT for me, though they did sort of end it in a reasonable sort of way. Anyway - just wondering if others are enjoying it or can’t watch!
I’ve only watched the first 15 minutes, the rest is on video for tonight. So I haven’t seen the bit with wigs yet. But I did see the bit where Tom was put off by Lynette’s bald head. I was annoyed at that. I know it’s only entertainment, and we’re not supposed to take it seriously, but I was watching with my teenage daughters, and I felt a bit awkward, and was upset for all those watching who have no hair at the moment. My husband never made any adverse comments about me being bald, but if I’d seen this episode when I didn’t have hair it would have made everything harder.
As for the general portrayal, they’ve made Lynette look quite ill at times which is good. I also think she looks great in her scarves.
I haven’t seen this, but funnily enough my OH has and was talking about it this evening and seemed to think that it was quite well done. Usually at home I just have a bare head and if I have my wig on and it is the end of the day he will say “take your wig off” as he knows it’s more comfortable without. I was saying how it is still so strange for me to see myself in the mirror, as you don’t feel the way you look. Have fluff now, but certainly no hair, OH has been just great, but we are both happy to say we are looking forward to when I have hair again. Get lots of affectionate strokes on the head, but wigs have been in the cupboard by the time we go to bed, so can’t comment on them as a fantasy sex aid!
My husband and I love watching it, and thought the last episode was very funny. I just hope he doesn’t get any ideas! It’s only TV!
Tracey
Ok, I am a Desperate Houseives addict. Am on the new season though, it gets better. I remember watching those shows and thought it was far fetched – although at the time didn’t realize it could be me!
I think its good how they keep her in scarves and looking sick. Not romanticing it at all. But, it is only a show. We have had 3 month sabbatical with DH with the writers strike…
Emily
I watched this episode and thought it was handled ok but I found the subject matter a bit too close to home for me. Mind you, if I accidentally turn over to Holby City I have to change channels quick as I can’t be doing with looking at anything to do with hospitals or medical issues! Feel that I’ve had more than enough of that in real life so don’t want to see any more on telly.
I missed the first two episodes of DH though and I can’t work out why Edie is still in it after the last episode of the previous series???
I’ve got a Finnish-style husband and son whose taste in TV doesn’t run to DH so I tape and watch later.I would have HATED to watch the wig-episode in company with either of them - and as for BOTH. No, no, no. Life’s too short. I thought it was quite well done - I enjoy the series in general - but it’s a series that deliberately avoids the ‘gritty reality’ genre, so I wouldn’t expect anything more than a variety of clichés, quite tastefully addressed, with some sly humour. If people can take advantage of aspects of BC - good on 'em, I say - can’t imagine it myself.
I envy those of you women - and Tessa Cunningham in the Daily Mail article which my sister sent me yesterday - whose husbands are physically supportive & don’t go to extraordinary lengths to avoid seeing long-term spouse without lots of clothes. The husband’s response (or failure to respond) to his wife’s naked skull in DH is an integral part of what faces me. Finnish-style OH has not touched me in any way beyond a few pats on the arm since I was diagnosed and quite possibly never will again. Pretty much how I feel when I pick up a tomato from the fruit bowl and my finger goes through a patch of rot and mould. Y’gotta laugh.
Hi, M-L
You do make me laugh with your description of your husband and son. Are the Finns so straight-laced? To be honest, I have only every known one Finnish person really well. She was my lecturer at uni. She taught physiology and pharmacology. She was about 60 and was married to a Brit. She was a lovely gentle soul and I got on with her very well. She said she found the British humour very strange and I know she didnt seem to get the jokes bandied round in class as she was very serious. The class was quite diverse - I was with a group of middleaged senior nurses who were dutifully sensible in class. However, we were in with a group of very young sport scientists - all young men who used to drag themselves in to class hungover etc. They used to stink of alcohol and could barely keep awake. I used to find it quite amusing at her attitude towards them - a mixture of horror and disgust. To my shame, I found them quite entertaining at times and would sit with them if the lesson looked like it was going to be boring . She also hated alcohol and used to preach to us about the dangers of alcohol and how it caused accidents etc, which only would make these young men tease her more. I am sure she was not typical of the Finnish. I also think your husband’s attitude is also typical of many British men, who find it difficult to deal with illness. Oh well, nought so queer as folk!
Take care,
Cathy
i thought DH was very good actually and it reminded me that my husband is having feelings about my cancer as well!!! it reminded me to look at the funny side of all this doom and gloom in cancer, Anna x x
Oh god, Cathy, Finns are a tiny little population with a fascinating/challenging/depressing past. One of the few ‘European’ nations who didn’t really achieve ‘voice-status’ until the early 90s. Other eastern-bloc countries achieved it about the same time but most of them had had periods of independence and character-development spanning centuries; Poland, Hungary, bits and pieces of all the other piecemeal E-Euro nations had periods of independence and all that it entails.
Finland was passed from centuries of Swedish imperialism straight into being a slightly more independent duchy of imperial Russia in 1807. A tiny country with probably the toughest fighting spirit around, they killed each other in droves to get free of Russia in 1917 & manned & womanned their long frontier with Russia again in 1939 & 1942 and killed 20 for every one of their own dead. Out of those Baltic countries - Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia - Finland was the only one that managed to retain its conditional independence after WWII. I think, in the end, the Soviet Union found it too goddam tiring to keep fighting. I know I do. You can hardly blame it & its people for a certain schizophrenia, however. Lots of Lutheran disapproval and lots of pagan hangover; lots of obedience and lots of rabid subversion.
emelle, I visited Finland in 1982 and everywhere we went everyone was at pains to tell us how Finland was not ruled by Russia! The thing that I remember most from that visit is the language - I am sure there were these hugely long words with no vowels in sight. And not many people spoke English which made it interesting.
well, husbands/SO in general find it hard to deal with BC. We deal with it on our own levels, I think.
I remind myself that where sexuality is concerned, perhaps it is difficult for intimacy since it now means intimacy with chemo, chemicals, poison, toxins. Not just us. And it also can be because we are now more fragile in their eyes; less then not wanting to love us (and I include myself in this mess), it may be that they don’t want to hurt us either.
At least that aspect makes me feel better about it.
Emily
My husband thought the husband in DH was a prat for going off his wife when her wig slipped off. I have a fuzz at the moment and my OH likes to see me without it. I think Lynette looks good bald although she still has her great lashes and brows ! so not too realistic huh !
Cally x
I was horrified by the DH episode, as I am starting to lose my hair goodstyle. The idea of my OH not fancying me anymore was really upsetting! I suppose, in reality, it is very easy for us to become (naturally) very self involved when fighting cancer, and forget our partner’s needs. But I find tension of any sort is usually resolved with sex! Don’t want my sex life to grind to a halt for six months, so I hope my OH is more supportive, less shallow and image conscious, and we can overcome the simple hurdle of how I look!
Sue x
I have not had chemo so am not bald. But I think that any man who would go off his wife because they had no hair is so shallow that he would be shown the door. My husband is going bald naturally and I love him for who he is not how much hair he has! If having a full head of hair is the main criteria to being loved, then God help us all.
Well, that DH series was on last season, and while I remember much of it, I did not have BC at the time so didn’t focus on it much. I agree, that if that was his reaction, it is shallow and petty. When my OH saw my fuzzy head, he was sad. He felt for me knowing the time I have put into having beautiful hair. Well, gone now!! At each step, he has been supportive so can’t see how I could balk if he got sexually turned off. We waited a good while after he had open heart surgery and hernia operations. I think it will be some time before we start again after this. Hopefully, by then the passion will build for a new start!!!
Emily
xxx
Hi Emily - I’ve enjoyed your mails on other, more serious threads, nice to see you on a chatty one as well. though perhaps this kind of thing is just as serious, in its way, for all of us in partnerships, or hoping to be in partnerships in future.
The DH episode directly addresses the sexuality issue, but that has moved so far down my personal list of ‘must dos’ I run out of paper before I get there. My own concern is with the withdrawal of hugs and so on. They seem sort of necessary to me - they gather up the bits that threaten to fly away and tuck them back neatly where they belong. In a knee-kerk response the OH has stopped voluntary physical contact altogether - and hugs you ask for don’t quite do the trick. And this is before I shave my head next Wednesday in preparation!! He’ll prbably stop looking at me directly then! He’s a good guy, but a bit of a kid. Always has been. It was what appealed, 22 years ago.
We can say that it’s shallow and petty to respond to physical disfigurement, illness, misfortune in negative ways - but what the hell! Our whole culture is geared towards this. Mass media shout the message with every word and image. Use the right makeup, mouthwash, hair conditioner, underwire bra, investment scheme - and you will be more lovable. People who easily circumvent this imperative are admirable (those who don’t notice appearances or other qualities such as poverty, fecklessness, eccentricity, bad breath) - the rest of us are merely normal. Those of the rest of us who struggle to get over it are real heroes, but not necessarily shallow and petty if unsuccessful. My own partner is just terribly disturbed by Tarzan-wife turning into sick Jane - and his own mother died of cancer, incredibly fast, when I was pregnant with our boy.
Now a partner who deserts in the face of illness - THAT is shallow and petty. No one here seems to have suffered that frightful fate - or no one has talked about it, anyway. Does anyone know of anyone to whom this has happened?
emelle -
thanks. It’s a great forum and I enjoy both the serious and fun postings. It sounds like your OH is scared. Perhaps it reminds him of his Mother’s cancer, perhaps he is afraid you will give in and die, perhaps he is just scared by the enormity of it all. With your analytical abilities, I am sure you have thought of this already.
You are right, of course. If we let it seep in, the media will tell us we need to live in a picture-perfect, happy world. Using the right furniture, the right table linens, the right makeup, the right everything for approval by everyone else. Teenagers find it hard not to succumb to that world since they are so seeking approval. But adults should know better. There is no perfect woman, perfect makeup, perfect anything. We are, in fact, astounding imperfect. And it is that imperfection that is attractive and wonderful. It is our diversity that is beautiful beyond anything we have created. I think that if you need to ask for a hug at the beginning to ease back into a relationship that is comfortable for you, you should do it and do it at an alarming rate until he gets the hint. You need physical touch; we all need it especially now since we feel so ugly and repulsive and NOT our perfect selves!
I truly hope no one posts back to you that they know if folks whose husbands/SO have deserted them because they were now imperfect. My take would be, who needs them anyway if they are so cold???
Emily
xxx
I guess human nature is such that we feel attracted to healthy looking people - I suppose its to do with the urge to replicate healthy genes and reading this post i can see a bit from both sides. so those who shun their partners when ill and not looking healthy are reacting in a way, normally. But surely in a civilised society, we should accept our neares and dearest even when they look awful, otherwise God help all the old people who look bad. and if someone does a runner when said wife/husband looks awful, they are just reacting normally too and can be forgiven?
I suppose human nature is geared up to want to be with those who look healthy - the animal kingdom certainly have ways of dealing with their ill and old. However, I still think that an intelligent human should be able to overcome their problem with their loved ones looking ill. When my son was very ill, I felt so much love for him even though he looked awful and almost alien with his bald head and yellow skin. Maybe mother love can overcome the cultural brainwashing. However, if we should accept that someone is not shallow because they are turned off by their partners appearance then we should also accept that they can no longer share their lives with them? It is only a small step away, surely? Interesting debate!!