To think the PoW’s diagnosis makes healthy living seem pointless?

[Notsuretoputit]

I try my best to live heathily (although definitely not fanatical). I try and stay away from ultra processed foods, try and avoid saturated fat, too much meat etc., try and exercise every week. I’ll have the odd takeaway and definitely overindulge on wine, but always try and be mindful of living heathily because so much information is constantly battering me through the radio, media etc. about getting ill from various foods and not exercising.

I’ve recently lost my mother far too young too, so I suppose it’s particularly on my mind at the moment. But then you hear Kate’s diagnosis, who obviously exercises regularly, has the best instructors, best food, best ingredients, best preparation, and she still falls ill, and it all seems a bit pointless.

AIBU to feel this way? I just wonder whether I really should make an effort to watch what I eat and run when I don’t feel like it if really, what will be will be regardless.

I think it is quite worrying but we don’t know what type it is or what caused it. It could have been from taking contraception or it might have been from exposure to asbestos (not likely given the facts but it illustrates how some things aren’t related to healthy living).

For me the scary thing is that despite having access to the best doctors money can buy, the best thing they can suggest is chemotherapy which is so hard on the body. I just kind of expected she’d have access to some wonder drug that the rest of us can’t afford. I’m not a conspiracy theorist but maybe she does and publicising that would highlight class divides in healthcare

I think you should get some help for your anxiety tbh

You can never answer any of those questions. There is no perfect diet that's going to prevent heart disease or cancer, and even if there was you could still get heart disease anyway. But that doesnt mean you eating a kebab every night is the same as eating a healthy diet

Thanks for that I’ll take a look

Thanks, I don’t need help for anxiety.

Yeah, the argument that it's better to die younger so you don't get dementia doesn't really make sense. A poor lifestyle can increase the risks of getting dementia younger.

Honestly a lot of people truly do believe that. I (now) have advanced cancer and am not much older than the PoW. Never smoked, healthy weight, vegetarian, I walk everywhere. I don’t even drink other than a glass of wine or two at Christmas! No cancer in my family whatsoever, and all grandparents lived to their 90s.

Someone even said recently that it must be due to air pollution as I live on a busy road! It’s not that busy, and I’ve only lived here for 10 years. People just want to reassure themselves that it won’t happen to them.

There are no guarantees in life, and that’s very hard for most people to accept. We can do our best to reduce the risk, and that’s all. Hell, some people have been enjoying a quiet evening at home when an aeroplane crashed down on them. You just never know.

(Someone did say to me that my healthy lifestyle was a waste actually. Apart from the fact that I enjoy it - I don’t WANT to smoke, or sit around all day - you just don’t know, perhaps I’d have had cancer at an even earlier age if I’d had a different lifestyle. The sad truth is that you can’t predict the future, no matter what. You can certainly give yourself the best possible chance of good health though.)

She gets a bug about once a month, excluding summer, which I don't think is that unusual. Even MN had a promoted thread recently saying something along the lines of children get sick 11 times a year. It's never been serious enough to warrant A&E but definitely causes several nights of broken sleep each time.

I have 2 and you’re spot on. In fact I would say that stress burden has more than doubled - they’re 4 and 1 so in addition to everything you have said, I have to monitor their play (oldest can be rough with her little brother), stop them from winding each other up, I can’t just leave one to watch telly or play while I quickly do something. Luckily my oldest seems quite robust now but the youngest is going through that god awful virus stage and wakes her up with his crying. I’ve visibly aged in the last 12 months alone, far more than the 3 years prior when I just had DD. My sleep is basically non existent, every second of the day is accounted for, we don’t have any grandparent help so it’s just me and DP cobbling it together taking a child each most of the time.

It’s hard to describe just how much children change your life. It’s 24 hours a day with no help unless you have a nearby young and very engaged retired grandparent or are a millionaire who can afford a live in nanny. It’s no exaggeration to say most parents of toddlers that I know average 5 hours sleep a night, 6 at most, and broken at that. Not because their children are terrible sleepers as such but because one child or another is constantly ill, teething, or going through some kind of regression/nightmares/bed wetting. Every single meal has to be made - you can’t just say, I don’t fancy cooking tonight so I’ll just have toast or get a takeaway. Every single plan you make is at the mercy of the children’s mood and what kind of state they’re in, their nap times, their feeding times. Everything in life is about seeing to somebody else before yourself, and that’s if you even find the time to see to yourself at all.

There’s no down time. If I sit with a cup of tea one of them comes up and wants to play, asks incessant questions, climbs on me, or I’m having to stop the youngest shoving things in his mouth or playing with things he shouldn’t be.

Physically it’s HARD. Years of carrying children, car seats, pushing prams up hill, lowering them into baths, stooping to pick up things they’ve dropped or thrown, breastfeeding, endless physical chores to clean up. I have terrible posture now and back pain. This part isn’t really discussed versus the mental/sleep side.

People don’t seem to get you can’t just ignore them, not feed them or bother with them. My child free line manager suggested I ‘leave my baby with a friend’ if I needed to catch up with work. It’s impossible to explain to people that haven’t been through it.

PoW's cancer is no-one's business other than her own. She has been essentially bullied into disclosing she is having adjuvant chemotherapy b ecause cancer was found after her abdomen op.

If she chooses to share at some point in the future, great, but if not, respect it. It's not worrying at all that a private individual has chosen not to disclose her private health information to the entire world.

You're still maximising your chances of good health by doing what you're doing. Some cancers have a genetic component and some are just bad luck but it's still worth avoiding other health problems (diabetes, heart disease, strokes etc) through healthy eating and exercise. Plus you will actually feel better, more energetic and fitter!

All depends - how much of something you eat etc.

Like I said upthread - relative risk and absolute risk

It’s all relative: how to understand cancer risk (theconversation.com)

e,g,

For instance, a woman from a Western country has a 2 in 100 chance (2% absolute lifetime risk) of developing cancer of the endometrium (lining of the uterus) by the age of 85.

If the woman is obese, her risk of endometrial cancer is twice that of a woman of ideal weight. That is, a relative risk of 2 or 100% greater chance of developing endometrial cancer than a woman who is not obese.

This 100% figure may sound like obese women have a very high risk of endometrial cancer. But, in fact, the risk is still quite low, since doubling the 2% population risk still only makes the absolute risk of endometrial cancer in obese women around 4%. This is still a low probability of cancer.

"people just want to reassure themselves it won't happen to them".

I think that's at the heart of it.

That and I think some people must (weirdly) find it easier to think its someone's fault than just think they are unlucky.

On a smaller scale people like to imply my children have severe allergies because of something I did /didn't do (ignoring the fact adults on both sides of the family have been diagnosed with severe allergies in adulthood)

I agree, live life in a way you enjoy (and for most of us that will include taking reasonable care of our health). But longevity isn't guaranteed for anyone, no matter how virtuous their lifestyle.

I'm so sorry you are experiencing this and I hope you know you are just desperately unlucky and it was nothing you could have done differently.

Ahh don't spoil everyone's fun with actual facts, most of Mumsnet seems to love hating fat people and blaming them for everything.

OP I agree. I think diet, smoking etc. matters but sometimes people are just really unlucky and that's a frightening prospect.

I think some people really do believe that. I lurked on the r/vegan subreddit a while ago, and there was a question about whether it's vegan to have medical treatment that was tested on animals. One poster (clearly trying to avoid the question) said, "That's not a problem for vegans, because veganism is such a healthy diet." Astonishingly, a few other posters agreed with her.

Just - WTF? Even you think if veganism is the ideal human diet (and I really don't think it is) how could you possibly believe it'll stop you from ever getting ill? Literally make you immortal?

@Shan5474

For me the scary thing is that despite having access to the best doctors money can buy, the best thing they can suggest is chemotherapy which is so hard on the body. I just kind of expected she’d have access to some wonder drug that the rest of us can’t afford. I’m not a conspiracy theorist but maybe she does and publicising that would highlight class divides in healthcare

When I was diagnosed, I contacted the consultant about seeing her privately. She told me not to waste my money (and that it would be better spent on a good holiday once I had recovered), and that the treatment I would receive on the NHS would be just as good as anything I would get seeing her privately.

She was right. The NHS care I have had and am continuing to have has been excellent.

There is no magic pill that cures cancer. It does not matter how much money one has, you can't buy a treatment that does not exist. I too am having preventative chemo, and believe me, if I could have paid for an alternative, I would have. They don't use chemotherapy willy nilly. They use it because it's still the beat option there is. Not everyone is offered it either. And it is more than likely that PoW's relative good health made her a good candidate for it because chemo can be so hard on the body - it ages the recipient by almost two decades.

@samarrange Aaagh what we should eat according to the Daily Mail! Yes, absolutely, something different every day. No wonder people get confused. :)

And yes a lot of the research is political.

I tend to follow Drs who have had dramatic success using nutrition and lifestyle over many many years rather than small scale research. I think it also helps to understand the why - it stops people being less susceptible, but it takes a lot of time ...

I couldn’t agree more. I can always tell when someone I know has been Googling my cancer and the long-term survival statistics because they cannot hide the fact that they believe I must be planning my funeral.

If the PoW or the King made their diagnoses known, then (outdated, and irrelevant on an individual level) statistics would be all over the DM and wherever else, along with detailed diagrams of how that particular type of cancer tends to metastasise, what the further surgery would be, the prognosis if this that and the other… just awful stuff that none of us would like to think about really. And imagine if everyone you met “knew” that about you. Absolute nightmare.

I am fascinated by the culture around cancer (the language of fighting, journeys, battles and so on) and the way a lot of people think they know all about it. Someone I met recently was quite taken aback to learn I had been diagnosed AFTER the covid jab was invented, I think he had already decided that the vaccine had caused it 😂. Cancer treatment is bad enough without all the armchair experts - whose sole medical training is that they once read the back of a paracetamol packet - sharing their opinions of you online.

I get what you are saying but wouldn’t say it’s pointless. My FIL has never smoked, exercises daily and always has done, rarely has any alcohol (maybe the odd glass at Christmas) and eats very healthy. He has stage four lung cancer 😢
I'm just going with everything in moderation x

Cancer has a myriad different causes - genetic, environmental, microbial (virus or bacteria), lifestyle, stress/trauma. The best thing to do in life is to be as strong and healthy as possible, and that will give you the best chance against anything that comes your way.

I agree it’s her choice to disclose information or not. Sorry if my post sounded unclear - I meant it’s worrying that perhaps a healthy lifestyle doesn’t make much of a difference (because cancer can be caused by many things), not it’s worrying that we don’t know what type of cancer she has

This is a controversial opinion but I think one of the principal causes of cancer can be stress. I’ve known 3 otherwise healthy people use of cancer after doing high-stress roles for a number of years. I think there’s a strong link. Healthy living (eating well/exercising regularly etc) is of course good for you. But more attention should be paid to your mental health. People do too much. Take on too much. It plays havoc with your body and you’re more likely to get cancer. I believe anyway

Stress and cancer

Stress and Cancer - NCI

I do think part of this is the constant public health campaigns screaming from the rafters ‘if you drink alcohol/eat saturated fat/are obese/eat too much sugar/eat too many additives etc. then YOU WILL GET ILL AND DIE’.

The public needs information about health, of course, but the constant campaigns against all vices probably do lead to thinking ‘if I do that bad thing I’ll be ill. If I don’t I wont’. Not necessarily even consciously, but it’s so constant it must seep into the subconscious for some people.

Maybe she would have got cancer 10 years ago had she not lived healthily. Not that all cancer is caused by your lifestyle, sometimes it's genetic and there's not much you can do about it. However, if you do happen to get any kind of horrible disease, whether that's cancer, Covid or Ebola, the healthier you are the better your chance of coming through the other side.

As for Kate, I feel sympathy for her, but the chances of her NOT being absolutely fine are extremely slim- I'm guessing the initial surgery was a result of symptoms which would have been picked up on and acted on at an extremely early stage, she wouldn't have spent any time on a waiting list; and there will be no treatment, therapy or comfort, regardless of cost, which she will not get access to. PoW having chemo at whatever private facility she goes to is not like your friend's Mum starting chemo at your local hospital.