by mikeb on Mon Sep 07, 2015 10:25 am
Good topic! I was very interested to read the comments from the previous respondents.
When I was diagnosed with MGUS and then with smoldering myeloma a year later, I did not share that information with my managers or co-workers. With one exception – I did tell one close friend at work. I didn't feel like those conditions were affecting my work performance at all. And I didn't want anyone that I worked with worrying about me or feeling sorry for me. In retrospect, I shouldn't have even told that friend because he worried a lot.
But when I progressed to symptomatic multiple myeloma, I did need to tell my managers and the people I worked most closely with at the time. It was not an easy conversation. It's very hard to tell anyone, "Hey, I've got a form of cancer." But I knew I'd need to rearrange my time to accommodate treatments, etc.
During my induction treatment, I continued to work full time. The main change I made was working almost all the time from home so that I could avoid the 1 hour + each way commute to and from the office. My manager and co-workers were great about this. Telecommuting was well established in our company partly because it was a global company, so that helped.
The company also provided good disability benefits during the time I was out following the stem cell transplant (SCT). I think I returned to work part time around Day +60 (after being in the hospital for a month). The HR people even insisted that I ramp back up to full time more slowly than I was planning on.
I continued to work through consolidation therapy and then through the first 6 months or so of maintenance therapy. During maintenance therapy, I drove into the office 1 or 2 days a week.
After around 6 months of maintenance, I was fortunate enough to be able to take advantage of what amounted to a "slightly early" retirement package. The multiple myeloma was a big factor in my decision in two ways.
Although I liked my job, there were lots of things outside of work that I wanted to have more time to do – especially travel, volunteer work, photography, and learning to play the trombone. I wondered whether multiple myeloma would cut short the amount of time I had for those and other non-work activities. And I thought I should do them now, while I could.
And multiple myeloma factored into the decision in a very different way. My job required quite a bit of analytic thinking and concentration. Following my SCT, it seemed to me that I never quite got back to the level of that cognitive performance that I had before. I felt like a professional athlete who had lost a step. None of my co-workers or managers ever mentioned to me that they noticed my performance declining, but it was apparent to me. I don't know how much of the decline was due to normal aging vs. chemo brain vs. whatever. I was still able to do my job, but I didn't feel like I was doing it at the level that I had been at for most of the 30+ years that I'd worked. And that feeling bothered me a lot. I didn't want to be like the athlete who hung on for way too long past his or her prime.
Like Carol D., I realize how fortunate I am to have been in a position financially and benefits-wise where I could consider the option of retiring.
And like Kully, I thank all my doctors, nurses, and other folks who have worked hard and helped me so much.
And I also thank the Myeloma Beacon staff for all your work in providing this forum and website for us to use to communicate and to learn from.
Happy Labor Day!
Mike
