survivor remorse

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Jeepguy654
Jeepguy654 Member Posts: 5 Member
edited February 2023 in Leukemia #1

I'm not sure if anyone has this issue. I've looked for years for people treated in the 1970s. No luck so far. It gets difficult thinking I'm one of a very few number.

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  • clcomito
    clcomito Member Posts: 2
    #2

    Hi, my daughter (who just turned 50), had a Wilm's Tumor when she was 8 months old. She was treated with one of the first chemos in 1973, (I think it was called Actinomycin). She has been cancer free for almost 50 years now.

  • po18guy
    po18guy CSN Member Posts: 1,539 Member
    edited February 2023 #3

    I know this is fairly common, but I have a substantially different view. Each life is a blessing and has purpose. Those diagnosed with cancer have often lost all hope. They withdraw - even from their loved ones! What does this do to those they love? You have been blessed with the gift of life and with that, the gift also of hope for others. and we know that hope does not disappoint! Have you ever addressed cancer patient groups? You can be both a wonderful testimony and motivator for them! They are looking for reasons for hope - grasping for something or someone to restore that lost hope. Their lives have meaning and purpose as well. Even though - even though - they may not survive, they desire to survive and hearing from someone who has trod that path might be just the boost they need to make it over the top.

    Never in my life would I have imagined that my purpose would be to encourage cancer patients. Never, that is, until it came to pass. Now, my world view teaches that we have hope no matter the outcome. I have strong beliefs but tell no one how or what to believe. And it is that belief that has shaped me into someone who stepped outside of myself and now desires the good of others - cancer patients in particular. Why not take that guilt and transform it into hope?

  • midn8t
    midn8t Member Posts: 12 Member
    #4

    I don't know if it is so much survivor remorse, or just a feeling of disappointment for myself.

    I got T cell ALL in 2012 when I was 33 during to treatment lasted till 2019 when I got research trail of stem cell transplant.

    then in 2021 or so I was declared good, but during this time period My mom passed away, my father and my best freind died of covid and every employer I have went to try to get work has told me my education is worth less as in my degree because its to old, and when asked about time lapse in work recorded health issue comes up and soon as employer learns I had leukemia or cancer I get ghosted.

    I guess sometimes it just feels like trying to ice skate up hill.

  • po18guy
    po18guy CSN Member Posts: 1,539 Member
    #5

    Oh! Siddhartha Mukherjee, writer of the Pulitzer Prize winning "The Emperor Of All Maladies" (highly recommended for all cancer patients) regarding the history of cancer, traced chemotherapy back to its origins in the stone age of the late 1940s. He located a woman in New Hampshire who had survived 50+ years despite being given horribly toxic doses of very early leukemia drugs. She is a 50 year survivor of a disease which had survival measured in months.

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