A better life… and unexpected

When she entered the office of the D^D Olivia Nguyen, Palliative Care Physician, Danielle Arbor was so unwell and desperate that she thought she would die.

“You would have told me that I would be here three years later talking to you, I wouldn’t have believed it! », says the 67-year-old lady, resident of Blainville.

Danielle, who today leads a happy life, has come a long way. In 2020, after surviving two cancers, the ex-barmaid thought she was finally at the end of her troubles. After chemotherapy, radiotherapy and immunotherapy treatments, the worst was behind her, she believed.

“I was sure I was cured. I had bought champagne. I invited the family…”

Instead of the party she already dreamed of at the end of her treatments, Danielle received a massive blow: she was told that she had another very aggressive cancer. He had to operate urgently.

Following her surgery, Danielle was unable to eat for seven months. She had a terrible quality of life. She was weak and very thin. His morale was low, especially since everything in his life was turning upside down. In addition to losing her health, she had lost her job, her boyfriend, her house. “I was taking 35 pills a day, sleeping 18 hours a day. I only weighed 108 pounds…”

When she was told she would need a tube in her stomach to force-feed her, it was too much for her.

“That’s when I gave up for the first time in my life. I am a go-getter in life. But after everything I had endured over the past six years, I said to myself: it’s not true that I’m going to go home with a machine to force-feed myself! It takes a quality of life from me! I want to be able to eat fish and have a glass of wine one day! »

To her pivot nurse, Danielle confided that she was considering medical assistance in dying. That’s when we talked to him about palliative care.

“When I was told about it, in my head, it was the end,” she says.

She did not imagine that it would, on the contrary, be the start of a new life.

Danielle is not the only one to spontaneously associate palliative care with death. I admit that this is also the idea I had. A reductive design that the D^D Olivia Nguyen, president of the Quebec Society of Palliative Care Physicians, wants to undo it.

“In the collective imagination and even in the health system, palliative care is death, it is the end of life. While we have known for more than ten years that palliative care improves the quality of life of people who have serious and severe illnesses,” observes the D^D Nguyen, clinical assistant professor at the University of Montreal.

She remembers the mission that Danielle’s pivotal nurse gave her: “Olivia, I have a patient, I told her that you would do miracles! »

” Miracles ? Let’s calm down! », said the D, laughing.^D Nguyen, who was nonetheless ready to take on the challenge, with scientific data to back it up.

By talking with Danielle, the doctor clearly felt the extent of her distress and developed a game plan with her to relieve her pain.

She listened to it. She supported her. She adjusted her medications. She suggested changes in her diet. And quickly, Danielle regained a taste for life.

Looking back, comparing the despair she was in when she first met “D^D Olivia” and the beautiful life she leads today, Danielle feels that her pivotal nurse was right to speak of “miracles”.

“D^D Olivia, with her charisma, came to pick me up. She is a woman of heart. I was on the ground. Now I’m standing. Yes, it worked miracles, especially with my pills! »

Today, Danielle no longer takes any medication, apart from half a sleeping pill before bed. She is doing so well that the D^D Nguyen discharged him from his outpatient palliative medicine clinic.

She who thought she was condemned, savors every moment of joy. Instead of thinking about what she can no longer do – staying out all night – she appreciates everything she can still do. Daily walks with her dog Yuki, given to her when she left the hospital three years ago. The small glass of wine she indulges in on occasion…

She who thought she would never work again, has been putting on her waitress apron 15 hours a week in a residence for the elderly for a year and a half. A very rewarding job that allows her to make ends meet while satisfying the sociable barmaid in her.

She who did not believe she would live long enough to be a grandmother, is delighted at the idea of ​​experiencing this great happiness in July alongside her daughter.

To those who, like her, will one day receive very bad news, Danielle likes to say: “Don’t end your life right away! Put a comma! »

For her, palliative care will have been this unexpected comma in a life still punctuated with happiness.