Day 12 -- The Node Wars

I was reading another cancer survivor's blog the other night.  She talked about how our semantics for cancer usually involve combative terms such as battle and fight.  She instead suggested living a peaceful co-existence w/ the cancer.  I believe we all have small amounts of unhealthy cells that, when given the proper environment, become cancerous and invade healthy cells thereby gathering an army determined to take-over our bodies.  I agree that we must learn to co-exist w/ cancer, but first we have to regain the upper hand, regain our foothold on a healthy life.  And to do this, we must go to war.

I am at heart a pacifist.  Being too young to protest the Vietnam War, I instead watched my brother be drafted into it.  And when the next war came along, I was old enough to march and rally against our involvement in the Middle East.  Here in the States I was fighting my own war against an employer who wanted to restrict my wearing a black arm-band and a father who couldn't understand my need to wear it.  Sometimes wars are necessary for freedom or reunification, and sometimes it's necessary to go to battle against cancerous lymph nodes knowing that they cannot be eradicated but controlled.  Here in the U.S., we are famous for wars that can never be won.  Our war on poverty still rages.  Our war on drugs is never-ending.  The beginning of our war on terror just celebrated its 10th anniversary.  Perhaps instead of attempting to beat these enemies into submission, we should beat them back far enough to where they can no longer harm us. 

When Mom was given a two-year prognosis, she vowed she would fight.  Ask any soldier and she'll tell you that a two-year deployment would be mentally and physically exhausting.  What if the patient soldier pushes her enemy back halfway and bids it to cross no farther?  She may live to fight another day.