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| Image from Michelle's Heart Songs |
Why don't doctors say that anymore? Because every once in a while, someone proves them wrong.
Doctors can diagnose all kinds of physical maladies -- tumors, disorders, diseases, malfunctioning organs that require dialysis or blood transfusions. What they cannot measure or see is the strength of the human spirit and a person's will to live.
I have known people who were diagnosed with stage IV breast cancer and are still living -- cancer free -- 20 years later.
I also know someone who was given an 80% survival rate but managed to be in the 20% who didn't survive his particular form of cancer.
My aunt was diagnosed with lung cancer, which moved to her brain, to her kidneys...and seven years after her initial diagnosis she finally succumbed to the disease. I believe that anyone else would not have survived the first treatment, much less battled on for seven more years. She lived to meet two of her grandbabies before leaving this world, something she would have missed had she not possessed such an indomitable spirit.
I am thinking of my friend and his family, and hoping that the doctors are wrong, because they cannot measure this man's will to live, or the strength of his family which surrounds him.
I saw so many of these stories at CCRF. One little boy stands out in my mind. He had a 5% chance at best and he has now been cancer free for a few years.
ReplyDeleteOn another topic, kind of similar, it's amazing how close you can feel to a blogger you've never met. I've been reading the blog Marriage Confessions for a couple of years. Her dad died unexpectedly of a heart attack this week and I bawled my eyes out last night when I read her post.