Maybe doctors don't want to scare the utter living shit out of everyone when they are about to undergo surgery, chemo rads etc. I guess it depends on where it's at when it's found as to what statistics they decide to tell the person they are treating and how much value they put in what ever studies arrived at that figure.
I was never told they were going to cure it. Only that the treatments would lessen the chance of recurrence, no guarantees.
The M word was only my original pathology and it didn't take a rocket scientist to work out that wasn't good and put me in a high chance of recurrence group. Plus working where I do as soon as I saw it I damn near peed my pants. I don't think it would do anyone any good to have those figures thrown at them at the start. Most people will go home and dr google as soon as they find out, whether that's a good or bad thing, we all do it so you pretty much know the reality up front.
The one thing I was annoyed with is that I assumed once the initial whole body CT was done and clear (my god how terrifying are waiting for those results) all was good.
My BS brought me back to reality when he informed me that the CT can't pick up anything that's not big enough to see yet. So I need to viligant forever. Didn't think about that.
I am not naive enough to think that with that amount of spread already that chemo zapped every single one of those little nasty cells. However, I hope it did. It's in hindsight, now that we know more that we read different things into what we were told at the beginning.
I disagree with changing logos and toning down the pink, add to it yes, but we have come way too far with that pink to change it. Everybody knows what it means. You see that pink and think breast cancer donations, I've seen it in action so many times at random events, supermarkets, pubs, clubs etc.
People see the pink and run over with their money to buy whatever it is, to help, to do their bit and give a few bucks. Even though they may know very little about the reality and hopefully will never need to it's still donations to go wherever the powers that be think it should go. That pink raised $38,500 on one day, at one beach in 5 hours.
Hope is probably the only emotion that can override fear. The fear of chemo and surgery overridden by the the hope that it works.
We hope the treatments do what they are designed to do and this goes for all stages of any cancer. We hope the treatments are getting better, more effective and that new ones are found with less side effects. Scientist hope they can eventually find out what causes it and what kills it for good.
xoxoxoxo
