Cancer and Emotions â The Moment of Diagnosis and Metaphoric Transformation

The following article concentrates on the cancer patientsâ emotions and metaphor-like expressions employed in Finnish cancer patientsâ written narratives. The aim is to analyse the significance of metaphors when they occur within cancer narratives to emphasise the internal and external transformations that follow the moment of cancer diagnosis. According to the materials analysed moment of cancer diagnosis may be interpreted as the most crucial in terms of the cancer experience, which for many cancer patients causes inner chaos and loss of the self. In recent discussions metaphors concerning illnesses and health have been interpreted as stigmatising markers in political, social, and cultural discourse. This article demonstrates how personal emotions become verbalised and expressed using metaphors, and how these metaphors function as a socioculturally bound key to comprehend and make comprehensible individual emotions