Cancer is a Journey, Not a Battle

I cringe every time I read or hear someone is “fighting cancer or battling cancer”. This language implies a war, which means there is a winner and a loser. I’m betting you know someone who died from cancer and you also know that person was anything but a loser. I realize it’s difficult to know what to say when someone is diagnosed and things like, “You’ll win this battle,” have become a likely platitude. I doubt, however, anyone would say Sen. McCain or Aretha Franklin were losers, and yet they “lost their battle.”

“Fighting cancer” became popular when President Nixon declared a “War on Cancer” in signing the National Cancer Act of 1971. This act increased research funding and activism for cancer research, which was needed. Cancer research is expensive, time-consuming and draining. As Dr. Suneel Kamath, chief fellow of oncology at Northwestern Hospital said, “The ‘war’ maintains strong funding for cancer research and keeps morale high among the ‘soldiers’… cancer researchers.”

In this sense the war metaphor works; motivating researchers to fight; encouraging activism on behalf of patients; creating pressure to fund research. So let’s use it to push for a cure, but not to label cancer patients losers or winners.

My son, Michael did not survive medulloblastoma, but I don’t know of a braver, stronger, tougher person. And that’s not just Mama talking. Anyone who saw the bald headed kid playing basketball or baseball at the Bulls Sox Academy would say so. Anyone who watched him struggle to finish every Cross Country meet knowing he hated being last when he was used to being first would say so. Anyone who watched him let go of every last ability… reading, walking, eating, and talking with such humor and grace would say so.

Senator McCain was every bit the maverick he was known to be after his cancer diagnosis. He stood up for what he believed was right and made some unpopular decisions within his political party. He even planned his funeral to be an event that would bring people together and call us to be our best. When someone like Michael or Sen. McCain dies from cancer, their deaths are about timing. They died because cancer research failed to find answers for them in time not because they lacked toughness or desire.

Let’s remember the ‘battle’ metaphor implies incorrectly that surviving cancer is mostly about fighting hard and staying positive. A good attitude helps, but the greatest predictor of surviving cancer is the stage of the cancer, how aggressive it is and the available treatments. Surviving cancer is always the goal, but the real test for the cancer patient is how does he/she live with cancer? Given the burdens and darkness of the disease, can he/she still choose life? Choose to live as fully as possible, choose to stay in relationship to others and the world and make a difference where he/she can?

My son, Michael, Sen. McCain and Aretha Franklin may have “lost the battle” in the way we typically think of cancer deaths, but they sure as hell won the war. They continued to live despite their diagnosis and the burdens they carried. Cancer ended their lives, but it did not beat them. Let’s save the war metaphors for research because we must not rest until that battle is won. For those who are diagnosed, they carry burden enough without the weight of having to win a fight that is often mostly beyond their control.

I would invite us to ask ourselves, what other ways we can talk about living with cancer that are loving, encouraging and invite patients to stay engaged with life and hope for the future? In this way we help give cancer patients a perspective that is beyond simply winning or losing.

So will you please join me in changing the way we speak about cancer and the people going through it? Can we agree it is a journey, not a battle or a fight? Can we agree no matter the outcome, all cancer patients deserve the best care, the best research, more funding as well as our prayers and support?

We would love to hear your ideas and continue this conversation.

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