What Is Normal?

It was a question that first popped into my head while writing Touch.  The narrator, Kepler, jumps from body to body, never accessing the body’s memories as it does so, and on arrival will frequently complain.  ‘This guy is short-sighed but doesn’t have spectacles; she’s got flat feet but doesn’t have appropriate footwear; his knee creeks; she’s got very dry skin,’ etc. etc.  The problem Kepler has with all of this is that the people who’s bodies he’s inhabiting, are used to their conditions.  They’ve aged or eased into them, as we age into being elderly, without necessarily even noticing that something has changed in our bodies.  Whereas Kepler, hopping in from a stranger, immediately becomes aware of all the things that it defines as ‘abnormal’.

It’s a variation on that time-honoured question: ‘how do I know that what you perceive as ‘red’ is like the ‘red’ that I see?’  Answer: I can’t really.  We might experience the same emotional response to the colour, we might use the same terms to describe it – fiery, passionate, bloody – but these are all comparisons to other things that are relative within our perception.

On an entirely personal note, it’s a question I’ve been musing over these last few weeks, as I finally get round to talking to the doctor over a raft of minor complaints.  You know the kinda thing; creaky knee that doesn’t actually get in the way of you doing anything, but has been clicking for long enough that perhaps, at some point, you should maybe talk to someone about something maybe.  A touch of tinnitus; the odd repeat prescription for asthma etc., and of course (forgive the frankness of this) menstrual stuff.  None of these things are problems; merely annoyances.  Annoyances which I would rather not have, and which, in fifty years time, could become something else.

A few weeks ago, in fine female tradition, I sat down with my Mum and asked the question: “Mum, did you have massively irregular periods?”

Mum looked at me, astonished.  “Why do you ask?”

“I’m just curious.  It’s good to know history, and I don’t really know if there’s anything genetic up the family tree that could be affecting me now.”

“Well, no, not irregular as such, but….”  So saying, she filled me in on what little she knew, and I hummed and hahhed and finally said, “And what about your Mum?  Didn’t you once tell me she had a hysterectomy?”

“Yes, when she was 38.  Afterwards she said she realised she’d been an invalid all her life, until that moment.”

“See, that’s interesting, isn’t it?  My Gran felt so crippled by her own uterus that she only felt good once it was gone?”

“Yes, but on the other hand she was living in a decade where hysterectomies were very fashionable.  Surgery goes through trends like that – nearly none of my generation have their tonsils still, but yours…?”

I admitted: my generation mostly does have its own tonsils.  “What about cancer?” I asked.  “The doctor is very keen on using the pill to regulate the body…”

“That’s also a fashion,” tutted my Mum.

“Is there a history of cancer in the family?” I asked.

“Well no, not really.  There’s me, of course, and your grandfather of course, and his brothers and sisters, and their children, and your great grandmother, and of course your Dad had the beginning of something when he died, but other than that, no, not really, not that I can think of.”

At this my mouth kinda dropped.  “That’s a family tree riddled with cancer!”

“I wouldn’t say riddled…”

“How didn’t I know this?”

“I don’t know.  It’s just not something we usually talked about.”

Right there, the words that really mattered.  It’s not something we usually talked about.  My Mum is a kind and loving Mum, who will quite happily sit down with me when prompted to talk about anything and everything without a second thought.  But until she’s asked directly, she won’t say a word on the subject.  Medical things – let alone ‘women’s things’ were just something that you didn’t talk about in the time in which she was raised, and as for my grandparent’s generation – quiet stoicism were the words of the day.  If you had difficult periods, you just bore them without complaint, and sure, that’s great, and has a degree of nobility about it in a way, but on the other hand we live in an era where the NHS still exists.  It exists despite our government and I for one would rather talk about sex, blood and rock and roll, than get blind-sided by any of them.

There’s an inherent shame still attached to our bodies, it seems.  As a society we shuffle slowly towards the point where it’s almost okay for us to wear what we want and express a physicality we want – sorta – but medically speaking it’s still somehow considered something you just don’t talk about.  Sometimes you don’t talk about it because people don’t want to know, and that’s totally groovy – but sometimes important conversations, conversations about family history and the very simple question of ‘what is normal’ gets passed by.

So ‘what is normal’?  I have no idea.  I have had asthma all my life and do not know whether what I feel in my lungs when I run is ‘normal’ or a symptom of this condition.  I get a blocked nose and don’t know – is it normal to have a blocked nose this often, or is it strange?  I ache in certain muscles across my body on a fairly regular basis – is that normal?  How will I know, unless I talk to people, and more importantly, unless people talk to me?  In no way do I seek a medicalisation of society, or a world of hypochondria, but I still stand by the very firm belief that open and even discussion can only make a thing better.