How to revive your work life after cancer?

Once your cancer treatment ends, going back to our routine makes life more comforting and healing. It distracts and gives back the normal life outlook again once we return to our familiar routines, one such is work. Your workplace can renew your focus and concentration beyond cancer. Deciding to resume back your work is an excellent and powerful move, and if you’ve made up your mind, then you’re going to be alright. However, starting work after cancer requires some precautions, extra care, and planning to ensure you are mentally and physically strong to cope up with the transition.

What does it take to return to work as a cancer survivor?

As someone who’s just survived cancer, going back to work is not an easy decision. Many a time, there’s emotional and mental stress that comes along with cancer treatment that affects your work plans. If you’ve taken the strong decision to return to work, the first and foremost step must involve the doctor’s approval.

You need to make sure to go through the long-term side effects of your treatment, type of job and physical demands of it, and a need for follow-up care. If you’ve passed the doctor’s inquiries, you must reach out to your employer through a virtual or in-person meeting to discuss the details of the return. As a cancer survivor, you must discuss medical appointments, unpaid medical leave, work overload, and other difficulties with your employer to inform him where you stand. Once the employer agrees to your new changes in work, you can think of moving ahead.

How can work bring a change?

Returning to work is not going to be difficult if you are mentally prepared and know the benefit that comes along with it. Work is one of the great joys of people’s life that helps to build stronger relationships with others. Here’s to some reason how work will bring a new form of motivation and happiness in your life:

Income: Money is indisputably one of the most essential in life. After paying for the treatment and everything, financial security comes from work. There would be post-cancer medication and needs you’ll have where money can help upon, even help with your lifestyle thereby boosting your self-esteem.

Daily Practice: Work is a commitment that creates a routine in your life where you’ve always got to show up. Which is your case is quite healthy and beneficial as having a specific timing of work and a fixed break would keep your body active.

A Break: With cancer comes a loss of stress related to the financed, family, friends, health, etc which only mitigate your situation. So to take a break from the constant conversation of cancer and associated worries, it’s better to develop a distraction that takes you away. Work proves to be the best option as a distraction as having a fixed task assigned to you regularly will help your focus on those.

Socializing: Go out, have a conversation about other people’s lives and their problems. At the workplace, socialization is great since you meet your colleagues, clients, or vendors around that help you get in touch with the outer world rather than being stuck with oneself. Studies have shown that socializing with others at our lowest point of life improves mental and emotional help and decreased depression signs.

Even with our listed benefits, work can be challenging as a cancer survivor. You won’t just have to tackle physical but also mental distress, and other common hurdles of your workplace. Here are our listed problems you will face and how to brace yourself for them.

Problems that come along with work

You can experience fatigue, loss of memory, irritation, discomfort, and other side effects.

Solution:

Reach out to your medical teams of experts about work and your schedule to see if they’ll advise you with the necessary medication to fight the side effects efficiently.

Be comfortable with your pace. Don’t compare with what you were before and what you are now. You are this powerful person who just battled cancer for months and now your body will take time to heal. Even if your work takes longer nowadays, then allow yourself at that time.

If you get exhausted while working then take immediate breaks. Device your working hours into two or three lots, with some resting time in between to remain active.

Find it difficult to remember dates, timing and details then make remains, schedule work, and create time-tables. Always keep a notepad with you all the time to remind you of your work, important notices, and many more.

Book an appointment with Oncology experts at Oncoplus Cancer care.

Essential Steps to take before starting work

Reach out to Human Resource or employer

Your body and mental state are still vulnerable and need special allowances while working to carry out your responsibilities. Discussing or informing your HR or employer to see if they’d allow these changes with different working hours is a wise decision. You must explain to them what and why you need to create some changes so that they’ll understand your situation.

Though you won’t exactly get what you need however there would be a great help from your colleagues once you explain to them what your body is going through. Since people don’t know and it’s always good to let others know how and what you feel. Many enterprises allow work from home from keeping you safe from infection and other things. Don’t participate in travel-based assignments yet, wait till you feel ready and physically fit.

Don’t be guilty with the new changes & news you

What you’ve gone through, nobody else has which makes you special, powerful, and strong. Never keep that out of your mind so give your body enough time to gradually reach the heights of how you worked earlier. Don’t be guilty of your situation and put yourself down or inferior in front of others. Accept the new you and as time passes, you’ll find the old speed and pace.

Know your rights

Look out for worker allowance, leaves, insurance, etc to discover your option ahead. Your company has a policy on sick leaves, and other rights that you can access when you need them.

Pay attention to health

Even if work starts, don’t forget to make a schedule for food, medications in between breaks to avoid any complications. Skipping out on meals or medicine is not good. Also, don’t forget to keep yourself hydrated at work by sipping water consistently every day. Keep a water bottle in front of you so you are constantly reminded of it.

Apart from food, taking a few hours for resting and relaxing in a day also helps greatly for your body. Don’t get overworked, work at only the workplace while consistently doing relaxation activities such as meditation, light exercises, and deep breathing.

Seek Comfortable environment

Nothing beats comfort, especially at a workplace where you spend quite a lot of your daily life. Check your table and chair if they are suitable or not, if not then get an ergonomic chair for relaxing sitting arrangement. Bring along essential supplies that you might need like a foot-stool, heating pads, neck support, or others.

Look forward to new, positive changes as you’ve already passed the biggest challenge. Now, you are ready to tackle small hurdles and allow yourself to heal with time.

FAQS on returning to work after cancer

Your common question on work after cancer answered.

Q. Do I need to inform my new employer about my cancer?

No! It depends on you. If you want to mention your medical history or ask for medical leaves, follow-up visits, or remaining chemotherapy sessions, you might need to explain it. Other than this, your employer just needs to know if you’re qualified and capable of the job offer.

Q.Why do people treat me differently after surviving cancer?

Cancer can be concerning for everyone. Your colleagues are bound to bring our cancer in the initial stage due to curiosity. If you don’t prefer talking about it, then you just need to politely decline to talk about it with others and they’ll understand. Give some time and both of you will gradually return to normal and you’ll no longer feel sensitive talking over cancer.

Q. Would I be able to work similarly to before?

It’s difficult to say because your body has still not recovered yet. You won’t be able to work to your full potential due to physical tiredness and mental distress. However, you can take extra measures to tackle such situations. Here’s how you can do it.

• Learn to adapt to your new speed
• Keep calm and cope with new changes
• Accept and ask for help during these times
• Go easy with work competition
• Set priorities of task

Q. Can anyone train me for work-life better?

Yes! Before you take the big step, seek help from an occupational therapist to improve on everyday tasks associated with work. The occupation therapist will train and advise you with work citation and tackle specific challenges and restrictions. If you are struggling with physical changes like uncomfortable with prolonged hours of sitting, then physiotherapists can increasingly help decrease pain and build muscle strength. Or experiencing trouble with memory and focusing then neuropsychologists would work on enhancing your memory, confidence, and focus.

Book an appointment with the Best Cancer Specialist at Oncoplus Hospital.