A few months back, I wrote a post entitled “We Must Change” (originally posted May 10, 2011) about the importance of changing our lifestyles and the way we run this world … Since it got lost in the website redux, I will re-post this post. I am raising the issue again because a “legitimate research” study (meaning someone who actually invested money into asserting a worldview), was done supporting my arguments. Please see below for my

MY ORIGINAL POST:

We Must Change – May 10, 2011

A couple weeks ago as I sat in chemo with a fever and chills running down my spine, I came to an epiphany. I was struck by the sight of rows and rows of people of all different walks and stages of their lives, in chairs or on beds, hooked up to dripping IV bags. Machines ding-ed, nurses scrambled about, doctors popped in occasionally, as friends and family members sat attentively by their loved ones sides. People still smiled and cracked jokes. I could tell they were still human. But my realization was tragic.

This is not life. It can’t be. This is not how things should be. How did we get to this treacherous place?

The scene felt worse to me than any novel or film dystopia I had ever experienced. That’s because this was reality. Not some imaginary nightmare or story. This is ACTUALLY the world we live in.

So many people are affected by illness, and particularly cancer these days. If not ourselves, it is a family member, friend, colleague… and we only hear about it more and more. Cancer does not discriminate based on age, colour, gender, class, sexual orientation; it can happen to anyone. And if we do not change the way we live, I suspect one day that it is going to happen to all of us.

I’m sure there is obviously a complex interplay of factors, which brought humanity to our current unhealthy state. The way our food is produced, the radiation we are exposed to through different technologies, the pollution we have created, the culture of insatiable consumption we live within, unresolved emotional/mental/spiritual conflicts we refuse to face, etc. We cannot continue to sustain ourselves this way. And even if we could, it is sad that our lives would merely consist of “sustenance” rather than actually living and enjoying life to the fullest.

For patients like myself, chemotherapy is my best option for “survival”. But even chemo we know is a temporary solution to a much bigger problem for which there is no cure at the present time. Throughout my experience with this disease, I have always tried to treat my cancer as a chronic condition rather than a terminal one because I have always had hope that a cure would be discovered eventually or I’d be able to heal myself.

But treating cancer as a chronic illness should not be our standard. Enduring chemotherapy regimens for the rest of our lives is not the answer. Eliminating cancer’s potential to develop altogether in our systems should be the real goal. But this can only happen if we as a society change. This means changing our lifestyles (what we eat, where we buy our food, what kind of food we consume, how we prepare it), our mentality towards environmental sustainability (making different choices/taking different approaches to industrialization, urban sprawl, transportation systems) and our culture of overzealous consumption (taking only what we need and sharing more with others). All easier said than done I’m sure.

But if we don’t change, nothing will, and the suffering continues. Will you be ok with that?

THE STUDY ARTICLE: http://www.healthzone.ca/health/newsfeatures/cancer/article/1051051–healthier-living-could-cut-2-8-million-cancer-cases-a-year?bn=1

posted by Carrie Ng Grace
Tags: chemotherapy, cure, food, lifestyle
Filed under: Education/Statistics, Reflections, The Good Fight