Words

FormerMember over 3 years ago

1 reply
12 subscribers
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With more than a year on, effectively, lockdown, and more than three years since my diagnosis of incurable advanced prostate cancer, I've had loads of time to think about the language that surrounds cancer and its treatment.

For example, I loath the words 'cancer journey'. A journey ought to be a pleasant thing, hopefully with a positive outcome at the end of it. With cancer, that is thankfully the outcome for many patients, yet it's very seldom the case that the 'journey' is a pleasant one. I went to a lecture a couple of years ago where the speaker posed the question, "If we talk about cancer survivors, should we not also talk about cancer treatment survivors?"

That is never going to be the case with me and thousands like me and so I think linking a 'journey' to death is quite inappropriate.

As I say, perhaps too much time on my hands...

Andy131 over 3 years ago

I hope that I don't offend by saying that life is a journey, with many diversions along the way, some like a trip though a previously unknown valley can be quite nice, others a waste of time and effort. The destination is the same. My advice would always try to plan ahead, and make the journey as pleasant as possible.

My wife struggled with the diagnosis of terminal breast cancer, her world literally fell apart, it was too big an event to cope with. I'm an Engineer and have always seen any big problem as a series of small problems to be solved one after the other. We applied this to life with cancer, taking one step at a time one day at a time, small chunks that can be managed. If you like a series of small journeys one after the other to make a fantastic journey that is life.

My wife is unfortunately coming to the end, the doctors today have said that they will no longer be treating the cancers and just concentrating on alleviating the symptoms. We have spent the last few days recalling the many many adventures, grateful that we crammed so much in, and angry about the ones that we could have taken if her health had lasted just a little bit longer.

Don't waste the time you have on your hands, travel to interesting places (doesn't have to be far), meet people, enjoy the precious gift that you have of life.