Isabel Sternthal

LIA at Maggie’s Barts

Week 6

This is my final day of my LIA placement at Maggie’s Barts. I am going to be so sad to be leaving this community, and feel so fortunate to have had this experience. This week, I wanted to focus on spending time with center visitors and staff, and on participating in center activities which I had not yet had the opportunity to observe. This included a session called “look good feel better,” which was run by professional makeup artists to help people feel more confident in their body image while undergoing cancer treatment. I was inspired to see the transformation in self confidence that occurred over the two hours. At the beginning of the session, the participants were largely silent with their eyes fixed down at the table. By the end, they held their heads much higher, and were engaging with both the session leaders and one another. The session leaders did an excellent job of ensuring that the participants did not feel that focusing on their physical appearance was superficial or about other people, but rather about feeling good in one’s own skin, whatever that meant to them. 

I also had the opportunity to attend a “prehab” session- an informational seminar for patients and their families before starting treatment. The goal of the afternoon is to provide psychological, nutritional, and physical activity oriented guidance so that patients know what to expect in the coming weeks. Speaking to patients in this early stage of the cancer continuum, I learned a great deal from watching the group take in the information. The lessons I took from this were less articulable lessons than felt ones, as is true of so much of my experience here. To get a glimpse of what it is like to feel the weight of informational overwhelm, to be reliant on science that one may not understand, and to face the stress of uncertainty for oneself or a loved one has been a profoundly informative and knowledge-thickening experience. I will be sad to leave this fantastic team and the center visitors, but feel lucky to leave wanting more.