Talk to enough people and you will run across "Chemo is poison! It kills you slowly and they profit from it!" or "She choose not to do chemo and travel the world, so awesome! That stuff is really what kills you. Is that worth it?"
Oh. My. God. Keep me from strangling someone.
I respect people who have undergone treatment and choose to stop down the road. I respect the person who chooses not to. It is their body and they can do what they want with it. But what angers me is the peanut gallery that chimes in and denigrates treatment, specifically chemo, as if foregoing it is the "smart thing" to do. Their comments lack serious perspective.
Example 1: Forego chemo and avoid all those nasty side effects!
This ignores that advanced cancer itself can have serious symptoms. My quality of life at the time of my diagnoses was terrible. Getting dressed for work looked like this: Put shirt on. Lay down. Put pants on. Lay down. Make toast. Lay down. Washing my hair took so much energy I would be out of breathe! Eating was painful, so I ate a slice of toast a day. I lost 45 pounds rapidly. And severe pain rang from my liver all the time.
With chemo, I am tired for a few days, don't have much of an appetite, have painful hands- but I live a pretty normal life most of the time now. Tell me- would I be traveling the world if I couldn't get out of bed?
Example 2: Go skydiving with the time you have left (a la, the Bucket List movie)!
Pretending I had no symptoms from my cancer, did I mention I work full time? That I am a 30 something year old with no substantial savings? I am lucky to have some help with medical bills through wonderful donations to my GoFundMe, but that doesn't mean I can go on disability tomorrow and afford to go ride an elephant in Indonesia. That is a reality for a lot of people. Without treatment, most of us wouldn't be having life-affirming experiences riding a motorcart in Italy. We would just be dying slowly on our fucking couch.
Example 3: What works for a 90 year old woman does not for me.
I keep seeing a post for an inspirational 90 year old that forewent treatment to travel the world- she was 90. The comments glow with anti-treatment sentiments. She lived my life three times over. Enough said.
Example 4: Chemo destroys your body, so it is not worth it.
You know what else destroys your body? Cancer. Before chemo existed, the death rate from cancer was pretty much 100%, unless it could be easily hacked out of your body. Today, those numbers are radically different.
Is chemo worth it? YES. Even if I am not "cured", chemo will give me beautiful days with my friends and family. It can potentially give me years to enjoy them that I would have not otherwise had. Even if I were to someday choose to stop, I have lived almost a year from my diagnosis because of treatment.
People want everything given to them at no price and with no effort. People think everything has to be pretty and painless...that the cure is conveniently at the bottom of a maple syrup bottle or a bag of carrots. Do people do this for other conditions? Fertility treatments are painful, surgery is painful, drugs have side effects, organ transplants, the list goes on. We shouldn't be judged because we put away our cynicism and put faith in our doctors.
Chemo is a jerk sometimes, but he is my friend. If this is the price I pay for another day, I do it gladly. Do what you please with your body, but don't make me feel like I'm the idiot here because I want to live.
Oh. My. God. Keep me from strangling someone.
I respect people who have undergone treatment and choose to stop down the road. I respect the person who chooses not to. It is their body and they can do what they want with it. But what angers me is the peanut gallery that chimes in and denigrates treatment, specifically chemo, as if foregoing it is the "smart thing" to do. Their comments lack serious perspective.
Example 1: Forego chemo and avoid all those nasty side effects!
This ignores that advanced cancer itself can have serious symptoms. My quality of life at the time of my diagnoses was terrible. Getting dressed for work looked like this: Put shirt on. Lay down. Put pants on. Lay down. Make toast. Lay down. Washing my hair took so much energy I would be out of breathe! Eating was painful, so I ate a slice of toast a day. I lost 45 pounds rapidly. And severe pain rang from my liver all the time.
With chemo, I am tired for a few days, don't have much of an appetite, have painful hands- but I live a pretty normal life most of the time now. Tell me- would I be traveling the world if I couldn't get out of bed?
Example 2: Go skydiving with the time you have left (a la, the Bucket List movie)!
Pretending I had no symptoms from my cancer, did I mention I work full time? That I am a 30 something year old with no substantial savings? I am lucky to have some help with medical bills through wonderful donations to my GoFundMe, but that doesn't mean I can go on disability tomorrow and afford to go ride an elephant in Indonesia. That is a reality for a lot of people. Without treatment, most of us wouldn't be having life-affirming experiences riding a motorcart in Italy. We would just be dying slowly on our fucking couch.
Example 3: What works for a 90 year old woman does not for me.
I keep seeing a post for an inspirational 90 year old that forewent treatment to travel the world- she was 90. The comments glow with anti-treatment sentiments. She lived my life three times over. Enough said.
Example 4: Chemo destroys your body, so it is not worth it.
You know what else destroys your body? Cancer. Before chemo existed, the death rate from cancer was pretty much 100%, unless it could be easily hacked out of your body. Today, those numbers are radically different.
Is chemo worth it? YES. Even if I am not "cured", chemo will give me beautiful days with my friends and family. It can potentially give me years to enjoy them that I would have not otherwise had. Even if I were to someday choose to stop, I have lived almost a year from my diagnosis because of treatment.
People want everything given to them at no price and with no effort. People think everything has to be pretty and painless...that the cure is conveniently at the bottom of a maple syrup bottle or a bag of carrots. Do people do this for other conditions? Fertility treatments are painful, surgery is painful, drugs have side effects, organ transplants, the list goes on. We shouldn't be judged because we put away our cynicism and put faith in our doctors.
Chemo is a jerk sometimes, but he is my friend. If this is the price I pay for another day, I do it gladly. Do what you please with your body, but don't make me feel like I'm the idiot here because I want to live.
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