To hate the rhetoric surrounding cancer

[beewritesx]

My dad passed away last night so slightly emotional post ...

I really can't stand the rhetoric surrounding cancer. Whilst I know that anybody with this awful disease has a fight on their hands, I personally can't stand it when tabloids post that X "lost their battle to their cancer". No, they didn't. Their treatment stopped working. That's it!

My Dad was convinced he could "beat it". He put everything on hold because he thought he had a fighting chance. Realistically, he was in his sixties and smoked and drank all his life (in other words: his health wasn't great!). However, at the start of his diagnosis, he talked about going back to work as soon as he finished chemo and received the 'all clear'. He refused a mobility chair and didn't want visitors until he felt better. He was working on a novel he never had a chance to finish and his website has been taken down because he was too sick to update it. He also couldn't spend any time with his grandson because he was always too ill.

I'm not saying he shouldn't have had chemo. I just wish people hadn't given him all this false hope! 😥

Sorry about your dad, but I strongly disagree with you. Attitude can make the world of difference with all sickness.

@Balonzette

Sorry about your dad, but I strongly disagree with you. Attitude can make the world of difference with all sickness.

Can it? What attitude would someone need to not die of cancer then? Any peer reviewed research you can link to that shows where someone has 'beaten' cancer with attitude?

@Balonzette

Sorry about your dad, but I strongly disagree with you. Attitude can make the world of difference with all sickness.

In what way? You are not serousy suggesting that someone can be cured of stage 4 cancer by having the right 'attitude'?

The doctors fought my late DH's cancer for him. They did all they could, they bought him lots of extra time, but ultimately it didn't work

The day after we were told that all treatment was being withdrawn and that he was now in the terminal phase, I went into work (I'd been signed off for some time) to tell my boss of the situation. She's one of those people who 'doesn't see problems, only solutions'
When I told her that he was now terminal and only had a few weeks, she told me off for being negative. And that I should be more positive, because miracles happen.

Having the ‘right attitude’ to cancer is irrelevant. The patient and their body is simply the battleground, where cancer and medicine/other treatments/luck fight it out. You may as well blame the Somme battleground for the high WW1 death toll, if you think that the right attitude can defeat cancer.

@Balonzette yes it’s scary to face up to the fact we don’t have control in all situations, but in the long run I think it’s better to accept this rather than believe we have control when we simply don’t.

Attitude can certainly affect the quality of one's life during treatment. Some people are fortunate enough to have the type of personality that enables them to live as fully as possible, during that time and that's great.
But if survival relied on that we wouldn't know any strong personalities who died of it, and would have to question why some more negative people survived.