Highly recommend Tolstoy's Death of Ivan Ilyich. One alternative sequence is you can start at part II, read to the end, then read part I. Edit: My guess is part I is there to show the reader what his/her own reaction to death is, before he begins his lesson. http://www.lonestar.edu/departments/english/Tolstoy_Ivan.pdf
Leukemia Has Won
171–180 of 196 posts
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#172There is something you can do to help people with leukemia: register as a stem cell donor. Germany has a very strong system with 71.000 stem cell or bone marrow donations per year while there are only 11.000 cases of leukemia in Germany - most go to the rest of the world. There are 5.7 million registered donors[1] (total population is around 80 million). [1] https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/DKMS
Though I have not personally donated, I have been swabbed in the US via the BeTheMatch organization [0] and I know people who have donated. The swabbing process is very easy and free. However, donation is not as easy as with blood. The process covers a few weeks, typically a flight and overnight stay before donation, and then the process itself which can be difficult at times. One key thing that I discovered is that you do not ever meet your match and there are strict rules against this (due to prior events with racism, sexism, religious issues, etc).
Bone marrow donation is not an easy thing. However, it is a heroic thing. You are very personally and quite literally, saving someone's life that you will likely never meet (what a world we live in!). With blood donation, it's a bit less connected, at least here in the US. They tell you that you are saving up to 3 people's lives. But outside of the donation station, you never really think about it again or hear from anyone about it. With marrow donation, you, and only you, are the reason that another real person is alive [1]. It's much more, well, intimate(?) than with blood donation.
Also, as HN tends to be a bit more on the paranoid side, I checked and they do NOT store any genetic information about you. Only the lymphocyte tests are stored via HIPAA compliance and are deleted when you decide to go off the registry. It seems that they are not very shady, so to speak, and really are trying to save lives and nothing else.
Please, if you are able, consider becoming a donor today.
Be an honest-to-God, real, actual Hero today.
[1] Not to discount all the staff, nurses, doctors, researchers, financial donors, etc.
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#173It seems fasting can potentially help starving cancer. https://gero.usc.edu/cll/ It can help liver problems too, so maybe worth a shot as a last-resort attempt to stay alive.
For fucks sake man. You and the others leaving comments on his site about green tea, olive oil, diets, fasting, "ayurveda", and god(s) that will save us if we really believe... wtf. This is a guy that has a death sentence over his head. He's being doing treatment for years, his body is weak, probably has or will have pain regularly. Is this the moment to do fasting or drink freaking green tea? It's cancer guys, not a…
The link goes to a medical research project that suggests existing drugs are more effective when combined with a few days of partial fasting. It needs more research, but I don't think it's fair to lump it in with fad diets and green tea.
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#174Earlier quoted context omitted.
Doesn't that simply reflect their life and thoughts?
I think I kind of get the criticism. When you are told by a doctor that you have a thing and it's a very deadly thing, the psychological component -- for both you and everyone you deal with -- is huge. The specter of death and the battle with it can blot out the sun, so to speak. My experiences suggest that wresting your identity away from this pattern of thought is life giving and helps people survive in very practi…
What are examples of such self fulfilling prophecies?
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#175Earlier quoted context omitted.
> There are patients I see today who decided to fight, sought out any avenue they could and are alive and going on holidays with their kids today because of it. 20 or so years ago my uncle was given 6 mos. to live. I don't remember the exact type of cancer, but the survival rate was low. My grandfather, being an ex-military hard ass who had to fight and claw his entire life said to hell with that. Long story short, m…
A fighting attitude is harmful if it leads you to prioritize prolonging life at any cost.
Some people prefer to contemplate and accept. Some people prefer to fight hard until the end. Who are we to decide how people are supposed to live, or die?
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#176Clickbait title.
Come on!
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#177Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think I kind of get the criticism. When you are told by a doctor that you have a thing and it's a very deadly thing, the psychological component -- for both you and everyone you deal with -- is huge. The specter of death and the battle with it can blot out the sun, so to speak. My experiences suggest that wresting your identity away from this pattern of thought is life giving and helps people survive in very practi…
What are examples of such self fulfilling prophecies?
I used to spend a lot of time on chronic illness lists. I left all of them because it was a general truism that you couldn't talk about what worked since the absolute sickest people who had the most and worst horror stories were the same people who would outright mock things like removing carpeting from the house and going to all wood and tile floors or making dietary changes.
They were extremely dismissive of the idea that anything made a real difference and they insisted they couldn't be bothered with stuff like that because they wanted to "have a life" and their illness already took too much of their time as is. They simply didn't have time or energy for such "neurotic" and "obsessive" behavior.
It was absolutely verboten to point out that the people being proactive about diet and the like we're healthier than these people were. God forbid you should imply it was "their fault" that their prognosis was so extremely bad compared to the rest of the community. That would be cruel and would be "blaming the victim."
So I ultimately unsubscribed from whatever lists I hadn't already been thrown off of for the crime of suggesting that maybe us patients could do something effective without drugs, surgeries or a doctor's permission, like eat better and use non toxic cleaners and the like. I got off all the drugs and quit getting the email notices about another death in the chronic illness community.
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#178Jeeeesus. I'm incapable of understanding the mindset the man is in - total awareness of impending death. It must take tremendous courage - I think I would have been reduced to a quaking pile of jelly faced with the fact of mortality. What a person, what a reality.
> I'm incapable of understanding the mindset the man is in - total awareness of impending death. Seriously? Every human being on Earth over a toddler's age is totally aware of impending death. To date nobody has ever lived forever. The only question, for every human being, cancer or no, is how many years you get before you eventually die. Modern man just makes my head shake in disbelief sometimes...
Not sure your post deserves to be taken seriously as it seems sarcastic/arrogant and incredibly pedantic, but I will assume that's my own emotional response and try to distance myself from that knee-jerk reaction.
IMHO, most people live on autopilot with some sense of ignoring the reality of death. I think this decision we often tend to label as "feeling we are invincible". There's some underlying feeling that death is so far off that it almost doesn't seem real to us. Yes, intellectually, in a cold, logical sense the fact that we die is known to the majority of humanity. But I think that is irrelevant to the post to which you replied.
By total awareness of impending death, I believe the parent post was clearly implying that the author has had the gravity of the reality of death thrust upon them and made real to them in a way that few of us experience or choose to dwell on.
Once you are aware your time alive has been essentially quantified- in much more stark terms than "eventually", especially when the time remaining is rather short- I believe this is likely a unique psychological/emotional experience, one that is difficult to understand without ones self being put in that position.
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#179As a human it makes me so sad to read this post. I hope the rest of his life is meaningful, comfortable and pain-free. As a doctor it makes me so mad. We talk about winning and losing against cancer like its some game or some foe personified. Just because there aren't any more chemo therapy options doesn't mean there aren't treatment options. Just because he'll be home and not in the hospital doesn't mean his doctors…
Oh boy. Here's more "feel good" language change suggestions. No. Just not. This kind of thing is extremely hypocritical and insulting to all those who are actually fighting cancer. Both the patients, the doctors and research teams. >Cure seems like a goal that isn't realistic anymore. Where did you get that from? Both cure and 5 year survival rates are higher than ever and are slowly encroaching advanced stages of ca…
Death is a very personal thing. Would you tell the author of TFA that they are "giving up?"
Re: Leukemia Has Won
#180Hope a miracle happens to you, Alex
Miracles do not happen. What he needs is a donor and a crowdfunding campaign.
Miracles are just statically unlikely occurrences according to the viewer.
By stating they don't happen, you are alluding to an absolute truth, which can not be proven.