Down there on the right among the tweets about football and rubbish that give the impression I am coping well with my impending 3 year check up is a tweet with a link to the BBC television programme called The Big C and me, have you seen it yet? If not please try to.
Firstly it says a lot for CBT and mindfulness that with less than a week before I am back for x-rays and checks that I can actually sit and watch this without collapsing like a warm lump of jelly in fits of sadness and panic, but secondly this programme puts cancer patients front and centre into peoples front rooms and lives. Most people know someone who has had cancer but until it comes into the very centre of your life it is really difficult to understand the full effect it can have. It talks about it, the hopes and fears, the success and failure, problems with treatment, treatments that work, the support of dedicated NHS staff who no messing about here actually save lives, real lives, my life, every day and then most importantly the unconditional love of those who watch us go through it. It talks about cancer in their words, our words, not medical terms or hushed tones but shouting our words as loud as it can. I'm watching Phoebe discuss her blog and she talks how it has helped her stop bottling things up (yes, sounds very familiar to me), I see people going through it discussing their fear of leaving their kids, I see the tears of strength as they, we, take on this disease, head on because there is no other choice, taking it on is all they, we, can do (yes, very familiar again). I have also seen people make the decision not to have any more treatment as quality of life is what they want now above all else. I may be struggling at the minute but tonight 9 year old Mikey is taking on a brain tumour and a 30% survival rate and he is doing it with more bravery than I could manage and do you know what, I'm inspired to look at myself again, to find some strength to get through this next week because if he can manage it then I owe it to myself to try. The opening credits say that 2.5 million people in the UK are living with cancer and a 1000 people join us in "the club" everyday. I have talked before that our fear of it, our reluctance to say it's name, the expected death sentence of a diagnosis is what gives it the ability to create the fear it does and only by changing that reluctance, that fear, by talking openly can we truly beat it. It may win battles but we can win the war by refusing to give it that ability and this programme and it's "stars" do just that. Please give it a watch, their stories deserve to be heard.
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Darren EvansOn Feb 11th 2013 my life changed forever when I was diagnosed with a myxoid liposarcoma of the right thigh. This is my version of my life since then. Archives
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