To be angry at the TV/film/adverts portrayal of cancer.

[Thisvehicleisreversing]

The whole 'fuck you cancer' 'let's fight together' and pictures of attractive women with hair loss who are ballsy and glamourous with loads of friends around them taking part in fun-runs and coffee mornings.

Cancer isn't like that for everyone. My mum has lung cancer. On paper she's been very lucky, she flew through the first 2 loads of chemo and radiotherapy shrinking the tumour incredibly. Doctors have told her she should be dead by now but the chemo keeps on working.

She should have been one of the glamourous advert ladies, she still looked amazing, she fought cancer and was doing great.

So why was it that after a stomach bug in April she was too scared to leave the house? Stopped eating properly and lost 4 stone?

Cancer scared her. She thought this time it was going to be the end.

The chemo this time has really knocked her back. The weight loss and muscle wasting from not leaving the house has meant she's too weak to take the chemo well. She's lost her hair this time, she's exhausted, crying constantly and pushing her family away. She pretends her grandchildren don't exist because it makes it easier for her to deal with.

She's a shell of the woman she once was.

She's not the lady on the advert shouting in the camera, she's not one of the happy people wearing pink fairy wings. She's another person fighting cancer quietly, not wanting to be a nuisance, getting on with her own fight.

These adverts undoubtedly work in raising funds for incredible charities but please don't forget that cancer is a sickening, soul destroying disease. It's not all fun runs and feather boas.

You are right Pumpkin - for every person, for example, who responds favourably to the infantilised pinkyness of breast cancer marketing (ikklewikkle sugar pink teddy bears) there is someone who despises it and feels alienated and patronised by it.
It bothers me how this depiction feeds into general consciousness of all cancers. Is it truly raising awareness? Or feeding on cloying sentimentality?

I understand.

My ex died in December. Our three boys watched him die. I have spoke about this so many times. I still want to talk about it over and over.

It wasn't pretty, none of it.

My 15 year old heard an advert on the radio where it mentioned how someone beat cancer because they were strong or something. He wanted to throw the radio out because did that mean his dad was not strong? I started a thread about that here recently but it fucks me off when people talk about how they beat cancer because they were strong and when my friend got her 5 years all clear the amount of people on FB telling her that cancer never had a chance against such a strong person I felt sick to my stomach. Very happy for my friend but that was just weeks after my ex died and it made me angry.

My ex didn't die because he was weak, he died because the cancer took over. Nothing more to it.

I still feel traumatised for watching him go through it for four years and he was my ex, and I know my children are to even a greater extent obviously. I feel like my world has been shook upside down and my heart still aches. My children's lives have changed and it hurts.

Two months later they watched their granddad die of cancer, then a few months after another granddad died of cancer.

Sorry, feeling emotional.

Adverts do not portray cancer well at all.

I am sorry OP and to everyone else who has dealt with cancer themselves, or with a loved one.

It is fucking evil.

I agree about how irritating the pinkness of the breast cancer charities. Four years ago I was going through surgery, chemo and radio. Last year I had further surgery and radio. My overwhelming experience was of the horror of constipation and nausea! There is no glamour about being sick and bald however the money raised helped save my life so .....

YANBU

My MIL was diagnosed with advanced cancer 3 weeks ago. Its a silent primary cancer, and she will be dead within 6 months at best, due to the secondary cancers that have invaded her body and brain and are too advanced for treatment. At worst, she will die tomorrow.

Until 3 weeks ago, when she saw a GP with a very minor complaint, she was a strong, active, vigorous, intelligent woman. She is now a fragile shell of what she was.

I have to watch DH, and 3 x DS's see her go through this, as well as trying to support them, and her, and be the strong one, when the only diagnosis is a negative one.

I have great sympathy for cancer sufferers who have a chance, but am angry at the lack of support or publicity for those who are diagnosed with no chance and very little time.

I have had breast cancer,actually I think had a fairly easy time (but then I want to say touch wood,because if I say I'm fine it makes me wonder if cancer cells are lurking...)

I also don't like all the fight cancer,think positive,be strong and beat the disease talk .My Mum and Dad both died of cancer in different circumstances ,Mum particularly went through a lot,she was amazingly brave and positive - but sadly her disease wasn't curable.It just puts another burden on us,IMO - to keep up that positive "can do" attitude.

And I hate the pinkness of all the breast cancer stuff.The stereotyping of Womens Cancer (wrong in itself,of course)= Pink.Ugh.
But I am grateful that people do raise money,if any of it goes to find better treatments that is something good.

My husband died of a brain tumour. He was 50. It was a low grade tumour that became more aggressive. We coped or did we. I fell to bits several times as I lost the man I loved over 12 years so from age 38 as his memory failed. My son never really knew his dad as a normal person. Cancer will get you if it is the wrong type or very aggressive. I do get angry at these adverts.

Yes, exactly.

Cancer isn't pink and pretty.

It's having a very high fever, having three drips in your hand, tubes up your nose , vomiting continously, having to have a nurse syringe liquid meds onto your tongue, and having to be hauled around the bed when all you want to do is sleep after you've had a massive bout of faecal incontinence.

It's vomiting 35 times in two hours.

It's coming to a hospital scan, expecting to be told you have a migraine - and going home with a brain tumour, and not knowing if you'll see Christmas.

It's a bastarding fucking ugly disease.

It's not glittery, pink, soft voiced, cake and coffee and a cosy chatty. It's not something that can be bravely fought. It's not something that can be stood up to. It's not something you can go and 'get'.

Those patronising adverts, I don't imagine, comfort victims. Part of me feels that they satisfy the general public's need to feel they are doing something desirable for a good cause but the adverts just feel forty thousand miles from the shit my patients deal with daily. It upsets me every time.

YADNBU.

I agree wholeheartedly - the language they use is horrible.

It protrays those who died as those who didn't fight hard enough.

It makes my blood boil every time I see these adverts.

I wanted to nc but somehow can't on my phone.

I have had stage 3 breast cancer. after mastectomy and chemo. I am in remission.
I hated the idea that I could fight/ run races_/ baked cakes and solve this.

I worked for a cancer charity and still hate it. but it brings in money for research.
I still hate it and I did talk to people about it at work but it makes money so if we get to 3 in 4 survive maybe its worth the crap messages.

I feel so uncomfortable when I see those adverts. I really really don't like them.

The reality of cancer for my dad was losing half his body weight, going jaundice, having chronic diarrhoea and at the end no skin on his back. And the utterly crap treatment he got at hospital - two paracetemol at the end. My sister - well - she survived. But it was traumatic and horrible and there were times where we didn't know if she'd survive.

I find the whole advertising campaign just incredibly crass. It's embarrassing. It belittles things. It literally makes me cringe. No amount of "kicking cancer up the arse" or whatever it is they say goes anywhere near it. It's just crude and embarrassing. Whoever thought of it is so misguided.

All this money being made for research though- why are labs being run on such tight budgets? And only being given enough money for one or two years- 5 at the most? I worked for a lab which brought in relatively large grants, but one year out of every five was spent writing the grant proposals for the next five years. When commonly a new drug takes 20 years from design to clinical use.

Many new drugs are being developed in the us and abroad, or through pharma companies. All my colleagues still in research are working abroad, because the pay here is so bad.

The big pink fighting cancer thing always smacks of pr and marketing to me. Sat in their cosy offices with absolutely no idea of what it's like to be facing cancer, or at the frontline of research.

I think, although I can't remember (chemo brain! ), there is research indicating that the "fighting"/"being strong" mentality is unhelpful to cancer patients.

There's a distinction to be made between genuinely feeling positive/unfazed etc. which is obviously good if that's how you feel, and feeling like you have to put on an act or look strong for whatever reason, that must be a huge strain.

It's great if some people find the "fighting" mentality helpful to them, but I reckon they must be in the minority as I have yet to meet one.

Also I think some people just like the idea that they are somehow superior to others (stronger/tougher/healthier...). Maybe just because they have a massive ego (cancer doesn't make us better people!) or maybe because they cling to that security as a reason why their cancer won't come back.

But I don't think it is fair that a mindset that many actual cancer patients and their families find offensive and unhelpful is used just because "the public" likes it. We are the public. 1 in 3 (or is it now 1 in 2?) people will be affected by cancer at some point in their lifetime.

I expect not enough people complain about it, and when they do they are shouted down by the loud supporters of this mindset. I've seen that happen whenever I, or any friends, have spoken out against it even on personal Facebook pages.

YANBU, I hate it too. I think it's patronising and insulting to all those affected by cancer.

thisvehicle, Zombie is sure you will realise how grateful she is that you started this thread. She couldn't agree with you more.

Her current 'pet hate' is the CRUK television ad about now reaching the point where more people survive cancer than die from it. She particularly hates the almost throw away line "Of course there will still be dark days." She think it's insensitive towards those of us in those dark days and who know they will never be cured. Those of us who may be among the survivors now but who will almost certainly eventually die as a result of our cancer.

i fucking detest the whole you can fight cancer.

My nan had more fight than anyone I know, 10 days was all that it was for Dx to my nan falling to sleep for ever.

i know put flowers on her grave to annoy her, something she would love. Crazy old bat

There surely isn't anyone left who hasn't been touched by cancer, surely most people know the reality?

I suppose they came about as a reaction to the utter fear and terror people felt on hearing 'the C word', a way of saying it may not be as bad as you fear. But perhaps that's the dominant message now

My mum died of ovarian cancer 7 years ago very quickly. To use the "battle" analogy (which i personally despise it) was so fast it wasn't even a battle, it was a massacre. It was no failure on her part, it wasn't her fault, it was just what it was.

I actually complained about a cruk advert once because it cut far too close to the bone - I know they need to raise money but some thought for those of us dealing with these mirroring situations or grief wouldn't go amiss - and it's not like it's an unusual diagnosis. And do you know what that advert still grates on me years later.

As an aside I've had skin cancer twice - I'm only here because they keep chopping the b*** bits out - more luck and vigilance than battling.

Dp diagnosed 2 months ago with stage 4 cancer hates these adverts too.
He's been told his chemo (starting 24th) is to try and extend his life not cure him. He gets so fucked off with seeing them.

People assume as hes having chemo he'll be "fine". Yeah right....

And then there is that has caused offense in Norway.

I dont think people want to think about the dark side of cancer.

Not sure what the pink fluffy ads, and glamour videos are trying to achieve.

How do you fight cancer? How do you fight any illness?
My mum has not "battled" cancer. It is just there and there is nothing she can do. In her bone marrow. And now she has another one. But, she will be 80, and now she has dementia, so not even aware she has advanced cervical cancer....

YANBU, I have stage 4 breast cancer, hate all the pink crap.

I think it was Danny Baker who said, in response to an interviewer asking about him "beating" cancer, that it wasn't HIM who fought and beat cancer, it was medics who treated him and the researchers who developed the drugs.

DH would probably say the same about his experience of having cancer. Sure, he was certainly stoical in the face of some rather grim chemo, but there wasn't any "fighting" on his part. He just took the drugs he was given and waited for them to work.

I agree too. I lost both my breasts at 27. I didn't fight or conquer anything, I was a scared, angry, hairless vomiting mess.
I lost my young years, my figure and my hope.
It's twenty years later and of course I'm incredibly gratefull to be alive but i still think its a travesty that I spent my prime years with the black cloud of fear hanging over me and I hate the subject being used to entertain people.
I know fundraising is crucial but I also find people using it as a guise to fulfill some personal adventure or need to be seen as a great person cos they've raised money for "that terrible disease"
Bitter me? Nah

Yes and I was and often still am described as "brave" or "incredible" because I carried on working and looking after my 3 boys, but in actual fact what else could I do? We still needed to live and you can't weep forever.
It was still truly vile and I had little choice other than keep going.

I had breast cancer 8 years ago and I have lived with the fear ever since. Survivors aren't brave, we didn't fight, we weren't strong. We took the treatment, we endured the effects, we were butchered, poisoned and burned and after all that...just maybe we were lucky.