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My blog brother Rabbi Brad Hirschfield wrote a post this morning called “Senator Kennedy Did NOT “Lose” His Battle with Cancer.” Amen. I saw that New York Times headline myself today and it made me cringe. It’s no secret that our culture is all about winning, but to essentially call someone who dies of cancer a loser? Oy.
When I was sick it actually bothered me when people lauded me for “beating” cancer. I understand the sweet impulse, but there’s nothing better or braver or more noble about someone who survives an illness than someone who does not. If anything, the opposite is sometimes true. I think these illness-as-battle scenarios that are so popular (breast cancer-pink boxing gloves exist) do everyone a disservice. To heal–and in fact to have a good death–we actually in many ways need to release aggression and surrender to a calmer more balanced way of being. So the whole “War on Cancer” thing that Richard Nixon proclaimed in 1973 might be getting some things done with that macho “kick its ass, dude” energy, but overall may not be such a helpful framework.
And it’s not just cancer. Today it was announced that the actress Parker Posey had to withdraw from an upcoming play because of illness. A Times article included this bit of ridiculous deadline journalism: “[Parker Posey] may be a one-woman dynamo capable of several projects at once, but even she isn’t powerful enough to overcome Lyme disease.” Ok, I can’t even articulate what is so utterly backwards about that, but it’s wrong, right?
Maybe it’s this: Our strength and verve and “wins” actually very often have little to do with the external outcomes of our lives. If there is any winning to be had, it’s about the process–how we keep our wits, grace, sense of humor, stamina, and open heart in the midst of the hell of a horrible illness. And even if, say, that stuff isn’t present, we are human. The end-game for us all is the same. And maybe that’s why the “battle” scenarios are popular–to make it seem like we have more control than we do, to distance the “well” from the sick, to feel a little less mortal and fragile than we most definitely are.
posted August 27, 2009 at 7:55 pm
I agree with you. It’s absurd to talk about fighting or struggling with disease, as if it’s a wrestling match and Ted Kennedy didn’t try hard enough. It reminds me of a People magazine story from a few years ago on celebrities with new babies. The writer said, “These moms are too busy for postpartum depression”–as if mothers with PPD are simply lazy and really need more to do to keep from being depressed. Two poems come to mind: Francois Villon’s “Mort saisit sans exception”–Death seizes without exception, whether you’re rich or poor, wise or foolish… And Emily Dickinson’s: “I could not stop for Death, and so he kindly stopped for me.”
posted August 28, 2009 at 6:53 am
Well said and thank you so much for posting this piece. I am glad your viewpoint, which I share too, is now being discussed so openly in the blogosphere. Like you, I am very uncomfortable with some of the language of cancer we employ in the public arena. Many journalists writing about cancer do so in a very cliched way – speaking of cancer sufferers, victims, and those who win or lose the battle. I never saw myself as a “suffering from cancer” or its victim connotations and I am not alone in that. Neither am I comfortable with the war analogy – how often we see the words “lost their fight with cancer” or a “fight bravely borne”, when reading about the death of someone from cancer. It assumes that death is a failure and precludes the notion that often at the end, the person has made peace with their death. Besides, death, as Bird points out will stop for us us all one day – death is not a failure.
http://beyondbreastcancer.wordpress.com/2009/04/08/the-language-of-cancer/
posted August 28, 2009 at 7:33 am
THANK YOU, VALERIE REISS FOR YOUR VIEWPOINT….IT IS INDEED REFRESHING…THE PROCESS AND HOW ONE HANDLES IT IS TRULY OF MORE RELAVANCE THAN THE DIAGNOSIS ITSELF…AND SINCE THE LORD ALREADY KNOWS THE OUTCOME ONE WAY OR ANOTHER…SOMETIMES WE THE PATIENT ARE THE ONES WHO GETS ENLIGHTENED FOR THE PROCESS…I’VE HAD TOO MANY DIAGNOSIS AND FOUND GOD USED THEM ALL AS A TOOL FOR WITNESSING FOR SHARING HIS GRACE MERCY LOVE ANC COMPASSION…ALSO AS A MEANS OF ENCOURAGING MANY OTHERS…YES I ‘FOUGHT THE CALL’ YET EVENTUALLY AS MY AUNT TOLD ME JOAN YOU KNOW THERE IS NO DISEASE GOD CANNOT HEAL…AND YOUR DIAGNOSIS IS SIMPLY HIS TOOL AND SO ARE YOU…THANKS AGAIN VAL.
posted August 28, 2009 at 10:30 am
I do believe that God did create us to be powerful Beings. For that is what God is. We are not separete
Beings from our Creator. We live in God’s Heart. From that point of view, Cancer does not exist.
For we are actually body-beings, but Beings of Light and Love. Cancer is a dream in our hearts
that we are separate from God’s Eternal Love. A nightmare that we can wake up from!
posted August 28, 2009 at 10:32 am
I LEFT OUT THE WORD “NOT” we are NOT beings! love to you all!!
posted August 28, 2009 at 11:25 am
I think the problem with waging war on anything is just that! why wage war? Aren’t there enough wars in the world? No one wins–NO ONE WINS–in war. What I have found is that healing requires healing in so many ways. Making peace with our lives is what allows healing to happen. When we make peace with life, death is just the other side of the same coin. I think the Buddhists have it correct. We are all on our way to death. The journey is what counts, not the destination since that is a given. How to live well is the problem many people grapple with. I think it begins with learning to love yourself back to health. But when one cannot do that, accepting death as the ultimate reality is a noble way to depart.
posted September 1, 2009 at 6:20 am
Nearly 40 percent of all breast cancer cases in the United States could be prevented if women kept a healthy weight, drank less alcohol, exercised more and breastfed their babies, according to a report published on Tuesday.
The report, which reviewed 81 new studies on the links between lifestyle and cancer, showed that 70,000 breast cancer cases could be prevented in the United States alone every year.
“We are now more certain than ever that by maintaining a healthy weight, being physically active and limiting the amount of alcohol they drink, women can dramatically reduce their risk,” Dr. Martin Wiseman of the American Institute for Cancer Research/World Cancer Research Fund, who led the study, said in a statement.
“We estimate that almost 40 per cent of breast cancer cases in the United States, or about 70,000 cases every year, could be prevented by making these straightforward everyday changes,” added the AICR’s Susan Higginbotham.
Breast cancer kills 400,000 women and a few men globally every year, and 40,000 in the United States alone.
Many studies have shown a low-fat diet, regular exercise, keeping a lean weight and breastfeeding babies can prevent breast cancer. However, a significant percentage of cases are caused by faulty genes and not linked to lifestyle.
????????
posted September 1, 2009 at 6:20 am
Nearly 40 percent of all breast cancer cases in the United States could be prevented if women kept a healthy weight, drank less alcohol, exercised more and breastfed their babies, according to a report published on Tuesday.
The report, which reviewed 81 new studies on the links between lifestyle and cancer, showed that 70,000 breast cancer cases could be prevented in the United States alone every year.
“We are now more certain than ever that by maintaining a healthy weight, being physically active and limiting the amount of alcohol they drink, women can dramatically reduce their risk,” Dr. Martin Wiseman of the American Institute for Cancer Research/World Cancer Research Fund, who led the study, said in a statement.
“We estimate that almost 40 per cent of breast cancer cases in the United States, or about 70,000 cases every year, could be prevented by making these straightforward everyday changes,” added the AICR’s Susan Higginbotham.
Breast cancer kills 400,000 women and a few men globally every year, and 40,000 in the United States alone.
Many studies have shown a low-fat diet, regular exercise, keeping a lean weight and breastfeeding babies can prevent breast cancer. However, a significant percentage of cases are caused by faulty genes and not linked to lifestyle.
????????