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The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

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Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#51

Post by jotm »

LilBytes wrote: post #34
jotm wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's really not exclusive to America.

Well, based on my experience in the UK and Australia. We get blood tests on pretty much any occasion when we're unwell before we're subscribed to an array of opiates. Shit, I had my wisdom teeth taken out days ago and the dentist was apprehensive to give me anything stronger than ibuprofen and paracetamol. Unfortunately, I think you're mistaken.

Funny that you mention UK and blood tests. I was literally told I don't need one, so I went private for £100. I was right about something being wrong, too. Really can't generalize for the whole of UK, though, some parts are so deprived they might as well have no healthcare.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#52

Post by Gibbon1 »

bitcoinmoney wrote: post #46
mirimir wrote: post #12

Pancreatic cancer is almost always asymptomatic, until far too late for anything but palliative treatment. And it's extremely coagulogenic, so clots are often the initial symptom.

Why not test everyone then?

Two reasons.

False positives and the medical interventions that result aren't without risk.

Some cancers are just a death sentence. They start out virulent and spread quickly. And are immune to treatment. Detecting them early buys you nothing.

Flip side is some cancers progress slowly. Screening tends to catch the slow indolent cancers and miss the nasty ones. But because they progress slowly catching them early may provide not much benefit.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#53

Post by Gibbon1 »

verylittlemeat wrote: post #13
_bxg1 wrote: post #8

I'm going to go out on a limb and request that people not post this sort of thing here. HNers, I believe, have a higher-than-average rate of anxiety and psychosomaticism (myself included). Articles like this that don't include any real hopeful message or interesting takeaway just cause pointless distress for many of us.

On the contrary, articles like this remind me to not take life for granted. Ever since I read about Lee Holloway at Cloudflare I try to be grateful for every day on this Earth. I am 30 and yet so many promising and beloved people have died before my own young age. We will all die. I am lucky to still be here experiencing this life.

When I was in college I put off a lot of things, because I was waiting to get out into the 'real world'. Which when I got out into the 'real world' realized was just stupid. Life is as you live it. It's all the real world.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#54

Post by MiroF »

mirimir wrote: post #48
bitcoinmoney wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why not test everyone then?

I've wondered that myself. And for myself. I gather that it does take several years to go from early cancer cells to a tumor that's visible by MRI. But once there's a visible tumor, progression is much faster. And by the time you're clotting up and experiencing GI symptoms, you already have multiple metastases. But there's no specific blood test, as far as I know. So basically you'd need an annual MRI scan, I suspect…

No X-ray radiation from MRI - I’d bet it’s the cost thing.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#55

Post by MiroF »

asveikau wrote: post #10
_bxg1 wrote: post #8

I'm going to go out on a limb and request that people not post this sort of thing here. HNers, I believe, have a higher-than-average rate of anxiety and psychosomaticism (myself included). Articles like this that don't include any real hopeful message or interesting takeaway just cause pointless distress for many of us.

On the other hand, many people on HN just like most likely pretty much every human you meet needs to hear something like this in the end blurb: > If I get a soapbox, here’s my short shtick: We are all so fragile. Each day is precious. And the most important parts of our lives are the relationships we invest in. Carpe diem! Do something nice for your loved ones. Make friends with someone you dislike. Go be good to som…

Respectfully, it might be worth considering how people have a plurality or reactions to content. This content is obviously distressing and could have used some sort of warning.

Not everyone thinks or responds the same and it is good to be conscious of that.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#56

Post by DoreenMichele »

MiroF wrote: post #55
asveikau wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the other hand, many people on HN just like most likely pretty much every human you meet needs to hear something like this in the end blurb: > If I get a soapbox, here’s my short shtick: We are all so fragile. Each day is precious. And the most important parts of our lives are the relationships we invest in. Carpe diem! Do something nice for your loved ones. Make friends with someone you dislike. Go be good to som…

Respectfully, it might be worth considering how people have a plurality or reactions to content. This content is obviously distressing and could have used some sort of warning. Not everyone thinks or responds the same and it is good to be conscious of that.

I feel like the title of this one sufficiently conveys the kind of content you can expect. If you know this is a problem for you, you aren't required to read it. There will not be a test. The mods will not email you and inquire as to why you failed to comment on this particular article.

When I first joined, I was extremely ill and I turned off Show Dead because it just upset the hell out of me to see dead comments and dead articles. And I knew it was because I was so very sick and that made me emotionally fragile.

As I got healthier, that stopped bothering me and I turned on Show Dead because it's additional information and it's useful for knowing what is going on here.

I'm prone to nitpicking titles and I don't have any problem with people nitpicking titles because they feel the title didn't adequately signal that is wasn't really the kind of content they come here for. But I think it's overkill to ask people to not submit this kind of content.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#57

Post by badpun »

nicetryguy wrote: post #43
_bxg1 wrote: post #8

I'm going to go out on a limb and request that people not post this sort of thing here. HNers, I believe, have a higher-than-average rate of anxiety and psychosomaticism (myself included). Articles like this that don't include any real hopeful message or interesting takeaway just cause pointless distress for many of us.

The article was brutal. I think Wired should have put a warning at the beginning of the article, instead of the very end, but; do you really think censoring yourself from all harsh reality and expecting "disney" endings for everything is wise? Should every article contain a hopeful message with mandatory rose colored glasses? Should survivorship bias echoing be enforced? Zealous positivity can prevent you from somber…

> the cows and chickens that get brutally slaughtered so that you can eat meat and make necessary protein chains;

This one is solvable - you can either just don't eat meat (plenty of people don't eat meat and they seem to do fine) or eeat meat from animals which were treated humanely.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#58

Post by DoreenMichele »

My doctor ... wondered aloud if this was all in my head.

Just as a PSA: This is all too common with obscure conditions.

Before I finally got a proper diagsnosis, I spent months on antibiotics with doctors unsure what to do and when I expressed my concern with them having no answers and being unable to fix me that this could kill me, I was asked if I wanted to speak with a psychiatrist.

I wish medical doctors would be trained to never, ever dismiss anything as "all in your head."

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#59

Post by _bxg1 »

nicetryguy wrote: post #43
_bxg1 wrote: post #8

I'm going to go out on a limb and request that people not post this sort of thing here. HNers, I believe, have a higher-than-average rate of anxiety and psychosomaticism (myself included). Articles like this that don't include any real hopeful message or interesting takeaway just cause pointless distress for many of us.

The article was brutal. I think Wired should have put a warning at the beginning of the article, instead of the very end, but; do you really think censoring yourself from all harsh reality and expecting "disney" endings for everything is wise? Should every article contain a hopeful message with mandatory rose colored glasses? Should survivorship bias echoing be enforced? Zealous positivity can prevent you from somber…

You're making a lot of incorrect assumptions about my worldview, and I don't appreciate it.

No matter how grounded one's perspective is, each person has a finite amount of emotional energy to spend at a given time. This is a universal truth. Articles like this one can trash one's energy reserves - causing distress - without introducing any meaningful new information or perspective whatsoever. It's simply a bad cost/benefit ratio. I didn't learn any new hard truths by reading it, and I don't need your assistance to consider all of the bad things in the world, thank you very much. What I have trouble with is ceasing to do that even for a brief moment.

Don't preach at someone you don't have the faintest understanding of.

Re: The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)

#60

Post by MiroF »

DoreenMichele wrote: post #56
MiroF wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Respectfully, it might be worth considering how people have a plurality or reactions to content. This content is obviously distressing and could have used some sort of warning. Not everyone thinks or responds the same and it is good to be conscious of that.

I feel like the title of this one sufficiently conveys the kind of content you can expect. If you know this is a problem for you, you aren't required to read it. There will not be a test. The mods will not email you and inquire as to why you failed to comment on this particular article. When I first joined, I was extremely ill and I turned off Show Dead because it just upset the hell out of me to see dead comments an…

The title implies that we're reading someone writing on their struggle with death, not the last published words of a dying man, insisting that he will fight a disease and try to beat the odds, punctuated by the editors note that he died days writing after the article.

I'm sorry but I think that is deserving of a more explicit content warning, and I don't see what that would cost you or others.

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