How has it affected you?

[-Beautifully Beaten-]

Like a lot of other people, I lost loved ones to Cancer.
I know people handle things diffferently so I'm curious, how did Cancer affect you?

Personally, Brain and Pancreatic Cancer took both my grandparents. Now, I have a hard time letting people go. I'm scarred from the funerals and I always see them in the casket. I blamed God at first and asked, "Why them?" but I'm at peace with it now.

Tell your story or just chat. (:

 

[ii-ayoolilgangsta-ii]

Well there hasn't been any cancer in my family yet and I will pray cause I wouldn't want that to happen!!!!! Well I would blame got I would blame on the people who made them get cancer. Cause they decided not live a healthy life it was just there choice............  

[Blaizekit]

I don't fully agree with Godzilla, certainly there are risk factors but sometimes no matter what you do, you can get it. Besides, even if somebody makes a poor lifestyle choice (like smoking) they don't deserve to die for it.

As for how it's affected me, that's kind of hard to say. On one hand I don't care what others think of me quite so much, because I realize how short life is. On the other hand, at times I struggle with an unexplainable anger and an impatience with the everyday woes of other people. When my friends complain to me about normal stuff, especially parents, it's all I can do to not compare myself to them. (Usually I can resist though.) Watching two people that I love die within two years has undoubtedly left me with an underlying bitterness that I must fight against now that my initial grief has gone. I don't want to turn into a mean-spirited person.  

[Aubrilant]

Hasn't affected me? What can I say, I'm just too good for cancer. However I aspire to become a researcher and hopefully we can find some kind of cure or a way to reverse it.  

[Aubrilant]

I was just kidding about the whole being too good for cancer thing :] I don't have it though, neither does my dad. Who voted for God in the poll? (Father is a pastor) I will have to disagree with the whole blaming God thing.  

[Skittles and MMs]

It's hard seeing people close to me suffer. My aunt was diagnosed about a year ago with stage four ovarian cancer, which had spread to her lungs and breasts. They gave her about a year/year and a half to live. She's been taking some new medications, which they're testing on cancer patients, while also getting frequent chemo checkups. While I'm really sad that she probably won't be around much longer, I'm can't help but be overjoyed that she's been around this long. She's walking and doesn't want people to feel pity for her. She gets along very well and has a good outlook on her cancer and on her life.

I myself don't have cancer, but because of my family history, I will be getting myself tested for breast cancer when I'm older.  

[-Beautifully Beaten-]

I'm more with Blaizekit, I've become really bitter. Yes, I was young when it happened and it didn't settle in till later. I had a really hard time coping with it and now I'm short and pessimistic about life. I get especially snippy with people who don't apprectiate their grandparents and people like them.

I'm still in high school and I've filled it with medical classes. Hopefully to help people who have been diagnosed. Cancer runs strong in both sides of my family yet I've decided to smoke and do other stupid things. Yeah, I'm a prime candidate for Lung but it's not stopping me from getting something like Brain. Both grandparents were pot heads and they got Brain and Pancreatic. It sticks.

I can't judge people that blame God. I did myself for a long time. It's hard to digest the fact that He gave them life and gave me and my family joy just decided to up and take them.

(:

 

[Blaizekit]

I chose the myself option. That's because I feel like she could have survived longer, and maybe even beat it, if she hadn't had such an attitude of despair and low self-esteem. I feel like I could have taken a lot more effort to support her and make her feel strong and powerful enough to beat it. I don't let that feeling overwhelm me or anything. I have a pretty high self-esteem.

Also, I may have had some bitterness but I'm trying my very hardest not to let it own me. I want to replace it completely with sympathy and warmth. And I'm naturally optimistic so I know that it's only a matter of time before it will all heal. (:  

[-Beautifully Beaten-]

I can't really say how my grandmother was. She never let me see if she was ever suffering... I have a few memories of her being happy. My last Halloween with her, she had lost all her hair to chemo and she had my mom tape cotton balls to her eyebrows and she said she was Mr. Clean. That means a lot to me now but back then, it wasn't a big deal.

I don't blame myself for her getting Cancer... I blame myself for not appreciating more of the time I had with her. When the chemo got really bad, we'd go visit her in the hospital and I was more worried about my Gameboy and getting out of there... It hurts me so much now and thats why I'm bitter about things. I feel like a lot of people don't apprecitate what they really have and sometimes I do it too.

 

[Blaizekit]

Well, sure. It's human nature to take things for granted. 3nodding Especially when it comes to something like life-threatening disease, sometimes events in our lives don't even seem real. When someone we love is suffering before our eyes it's much easier to underestimate it and ignore it than it is to face the reality.  

[inky6]

Well I have two grandparents who have cancer, my grandmother on my fathers side has had four types all removed ( I'm pretty sure or at least been treated right now she is cancer free) and my grandfather on my mothers side is currently taking chemo for prostate cancer and melanoma (not sure if I spelled those right). It has affected me by making sure I dont make too many bad choices with how I live. For instance I wear a lot of sun block in the summer, they both have skin cancer. I also try to be positive because of it because they are both pretty happy people, my grandfather makes jokes with the nurses. Its also made me aware that I could get cancer or other people I care about because of family history. As for who I blame I dont really blame anyone because anybody could get cancer.  

[Meridyth Mayhem]

My neighbor got cancer and she was like my second mom, I blamed her husband because he was the one smoking in the house and Betsie (the woman who died of lung cancer) got cancer because of it. He blames everyone else for her death but my whole family blames him, he was the one smoking, he was the one who killed his true love.  

[Mysterious_Eyes]

My grandfather is currently suffering from lung cancer that has spread to his lymph nodes and brain. Poor, poor guy... sad  

[Mrs Manatee]

My lovely dad died of kidney cancer with secondary tumours on his lungs.

He never smoked in his life.

He was simply riddled with the disease because it wasn't spotted soon enough.

crying  

[Estonia Nerd]

My father's life was taken by Non-Hodgkin's Lymphoma. When I was 3. Those days were filled with so much pain and sorrow that, even though I dont remember the events of the days at all, I still remember the sadness and fear and pain felt. And I was only 3...

It stole me of 11 years and counting of father-son moments. 11 years that can never be made up. My mom remaried 3 years after his death, but my step dad just isnt my father...

*sad* I miss Papa!