Cancer and Fighting it!

I believe I know a bit about cancer and fighting it, because I am a cancer survivor myself, I survived lung cancer in 2013. I also have had people with cancer around me all my life now since I was 16. For a beginning to what I am going to say here let me make my point.
The first person I ran into, who had cancer was my grandfather on my mother’s side, who died of it in 1971, in a Nursing Home in Waterbury , Connecticut.
Second Person I met and knew who had cancer, had it from when she was 16 to 62, when she died of Ovarian Cancer.
Over the years now and I have lived 62, I have lost, others, my mother in 1991, my Step-father in 1990 and my real father in 1984. Cancer it seems is everywhere and sometimes, some people don’t catch it until it is far too late. I also have my second wife, who has breast cancer that started in 2006 and is still fighting it in 2018, as it has metastasized into her bones and tissue. So let me say this now before anyone, says anything, regarding this to me, I have lived it, I am living it and i will live it till the day I die.
Cancer is sneaky, deadly, painful and nasty. It is you fighting against your own body which has failed you in someway it seems. What produces cancer no one really knows, sometimes it is hereditary , sometimes it is caused by smoking or other devices being used, including alcohol, sometimes diabetes precedes it, and sometimes it just shows up. Like I said, Scientists and Doctors and everyone who fights cancer everywhere have no real idea of the causes for it comes in many ways.
They fight cancer by removing it, which means you lose vital organs and struggle on. They fight cancer by Intravenous and Chemo and giving you Radiation, which ultimately kills the cancer cells or kills you slowly. I have heard of all the different methods of fighting cancer, all the different types of chemo and directing of radiation too. and I have seen the effects and results too many times over. I am a stubborn survivor who fought back early, was diagnosed early and had it removed early, I was only stage one. Mine was found by accident actually, in a survey, done at a Veterans Administration Hospital. My Doctor asked about cancer history in my family and since the survey was going on, she sent me for a Pet Scan and I lit up. One month later, it was removed at the same hospital and has not come back since, thank god.
I was lucky the others I knew or know now are not so lucky, they struggle to survive , they fight daily with pain, memory loses, breathing problems and more. Bladder, bowel and kidney, and so many other forms of cancer abound out there, taking loved ones from us daily.
Currently my wife struggles on each day, unable to be the same woman she was before the cancer hit. her memory begins to fade, her emotions rise and fall like a roller coaster, and her abilities are slowly fading. She was a Graduate of UConn in her day, a mother of two, a wife of two, an actor in plays, a grandmother to six, even today. Her life is an epic tale in my book and I think anyone who can survive cancer this long and still be a bookkeeper at home and pay the bills and handle the money is a great person. The point being, inside cancer victims are struggling to remain in control of bodily functions, mental functions and even digestive functions. The person inside doesn’t change, even if the body fails in these ways as the cancer goes on.
I love my wife and always will till the day I die, for she is a special individual, who has a brain like no one else’s, a personality like no one else’s, she lives and loves life each day, she presses on to survive, even as her real living time diminishes. She has her loves, her hates, her ideas and she stresses them, and makes them work. Even now at Seventy Eight Years old the strength of her personality and mind comes through each day she lives, and I am sixteen years younger and can only say this, I hope when I get to the age she is today, if I do, that I can still function mentally the way she does today. She is quick, smart, determined to survive and it is what all cancer victims have to be. No one with cancer can surrender, stop fighting or give up, some will because the pain is too much, the cancer has spread too far, it is too viral and runs rampant through them. Sadly we lose them, and they are all missed by families and friends, they leave behind. They tire of the fight!
When you see a cancer patient, you may not even know they are one, till their hair falls out, or they get gaunt and thin, or they begin to have bodily functions desert them and need help. It is their determination and thoughts, their struggle to survive, their willpower and emotional and physical and mental commitment to being alive that makes them so great to be around. many run when they hear the word cancer, some run and hide from it and the ones that have it, afraid it is contagious or catchy in some way, it isn’t. The price of fighting cancer and other deadly diseases is astronomical and growing each day, scientist research for cures, but in the end, no one can afford the treatments anymore, and then we have The Republican Party and President Trump, who are rich and well to do who kill ObamaCare and leave all these patients with no help to survive and pay their medical bills or get help once their funds go south. Some say medicare, medicaid and social security are welfare programs,that is false and no one can convince me it isn’t. If the Republicans kill Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare or cut it back, millions of Americans will die without treatments or care. No one wants to be on Medicaid, Medicare or Social Security, no one wants to be sick, or need help and too many individuals out there, go oh get a job, stop being lazy, excuse me, I am not lazy, my wife is not lazy, those I knew who died of cancer are not lazy, we are fighting to live and survive and it is all we have to lean back on and get help to survive with. Don’t let the Republicans kill Social Security, Medicaid, or Medicare, don’t leave cancer patients with no protection, don’t leave the medically sick and needing help they can’t afford and need desperately. Help them, by keeping Social Security and refunding it, help them by making Uncle Sam keep Medicaid and Medicare, and Social Security!
I have seen the destruction cancer can do, in many forms it takes. I also have seen and heard die-hard Trump Supporters, telling him go ahead knock out these programs and get the free loafers off of them, there are no free loafers on them folks, they are people hurting and needing our help. Save Social Security, Save Medicare, Save Medicaid, because if you don’t you won’t have it either, and neither will your parents, you, your children or grandchildren and more generations to come! The bills and medical costs alone will bury you financially and the pain and hurt and loss will bury you emotionally too! Cancer kills, it is deadly and no one can solve or cure it as of yet, lets fight it together so those who have lost the battle will not have loss in Vain!