Reality Trauma

In 2011, I was a 26-year-old in my final year of a BA Photography course in London. I was living a very busy life, I was ambitious and was looking forward to a creative future. I had a project that I had wanted to realise since I was living and working in Vancouver in 2007. I was fascinated by the lives of people living in the Downtown Eastside area of the city and wanted to document them and the community they lived in. I would go on to spend five weeks working in freezing conditions, photographing and interviewing drug addicts, alcoholics and people with illnesses or disabilities who seemed to have been let down and abandoned by society. Little did I know, when I got on a plane to Canada from the UK, that I had a debilitating and life-threatening illness myself. I had had a violent, constant cough, a lack of appetite and pain in my chest and back. This, along with a gradual weight loss and a very high white blood count, led to me spending three days in hospital before I left the UK on an IV drip, while doctors tried to discover what was wrong with me. I knew that I was unwell and so did the doctors, but had no diagnosis other than ‘possible pneumonia’. My health had gradually got worse over a period of six to nine months during which I had visited many clinics and doctors who all gave me varying diagnoses from asthma to needing to see a physiotherapist. I put my pains down to carrying heavy camera equipment. Since I couldn’t get a refund on my flight, I decided to take the risk. Upon my return to the UK in January 2012, I arrived at my parents’ home in Eastbourne coughing up blood. My mother had tears in her eyes and we both knew that my life would change from that moment on. My local doctor advised me to go to Accident and Emergency and I subsequently spent several weeks being examined and tested. Eventually, after a lung biopsy operation, I was diagnosed with stage 4b Hodgkin Lymphoma and a tumour was found to be spreading through almost half of my chest. ‘Reality Trauma’ is a series of photographic self-portraits I produced from March 2012, while in a very fragile state. I was overwhelmed by the chemotherapy treatment, which lasted for six months, and had to face the idea of possibly dying. I felt a real need to record my journey and document my life as it changed so drastically. My body became a shell, limited in movement, filled with pain, while I could do nothing but hope and wait for every treatment to end. The image of who I thought I was became unfamiliar, almost alien, losing my hair and so much weight, unable to recognize my reflection in the mirror, which I avoided at all costs. The hospital staff and doctors became like a family to me. I put my trust in them through every biopsy and every significant event that required me to surrender to things beyond my control. My identity felt crushed, yet I didn’t mind because I knew this perception of a helpless human being was not really me. Inside I was strong, determined and hopeful… and utterly terrified. My life slowed down to just concentrating on getting through each moment; drug to drug, endless exams, giant needles, biopsies drilling into bone, tubes down my throat and always hoping for some day the pain to end. A plastic line inserted to my heart fed medicine through my arm, trying to kill the cancer but taking away my strength with it. The cure seemed to be as dangerous as the disease and chemotherapy can take one to the very edge of life. Severe weight loss was the most visible result and my skeleton became more visible by the day, a reminder of each precious pound lost. The powerful painkillers pushed my fragile lifeboat even further from the shore of what was once my life, nauseating me and bending every sense. Would I live through this? I did not know, but I held on. A meditative focus on the small things that mattered really helped. I found a great deal of comfort in talking to those in hospital who had had similar experiences and spending time with family and friends. Those moments can best be recalled through a single memorable photographic image. Nothing can take me back to my time with cancer like a photograph, that moment in its entirety, as if I were there again, re-living the sensations, the feelings and the fears. Traumatic times can be reflected upon as lessons in survival that awaken us to cherish the subtleties of everyday life that can so easily be taken for granted. The immense persistence, willpower and courage that we as human beings possess when required to is sometimes overlooked. We do not give ourselves the credit for fighting some of life’s toughest battles. This period in my life is evidence for me that no matter what life throws at us, we can get through it, even when words cannot explain who ‘we’ are anymore, why we are here or even what has happened to us. We are more than survivors, we are more than we think we are and we are capable of anything if we believe in ourselves and push those boundaries beyond our imagined limits. What makes us important as human beings is being able to evolve and become and to create anything in this lifetime. We must allow ourselves the credit we deserve and see beyond the ‘now’ because anything that we believe we are now, in this very moment in time, is temporary. We are always changing and becoming something else. Change can be the biggest part of who we think we are and my ‘self-portrait’ is a portrait of a person in one moment in time. This work is a collection of moments and identities, recorded through the medium of photography. If it is indeed true that a simple smile, a small gesture of help or a kind word can change how a person feels and have a positive effect on every cell in the body, then I hope that a positive photographic story can help change someone’s life. These photographs evoke some painful memories for me, but they also remind me of the huge capacity of my own body to endure such hellish times. My body, mind and soul were tested to unimaginable limits and I experienced life on a level I never thought possible. This self-reflective collection of images gives only glimpses into that time but my hope is that the viewer can see not just the horrifying aspects of the illness but also the promise that being a survivor of cancer gives and some hope for others facing a similar condition.