Tuesday, April 04, 2006

Cancer Sucks! Any Kind of Cancer Sucks!

Today I visited one of my fellow bloggers page, and found his mom had died of complications from breast cancer. She was tumor free, but sometimes treating the cancer is the thing that ends up taking you. Despite all the funding and research that goes into breast cancer, more than what lung cancer gets, people still die from this disease.

Yesterday, I asked you to leave comments on a blog, because a dollar was going to be donated for each comment so that Ben Steadman's family could get a plaque in the Memorial Garden at the Anschutz Cancer Center. Ben had diffuse pontine glioma, which is a tumor of the brainstem that usually diagnosed in children ages 5-10 years.

I will admit I have been resentful of the pink ribbon. Breast cancer patients have a high survival rate. You can find that pink ribbon everywhere. They have runs and walks for breast cancer. Yogurt lids are covered in pink where you can collect them to submit for donation. My aunt even survived breast cancer. If people rallied for lung cancer the same way, my sister could still be here today.

My mom has met some people who are against the American Cancer Society. They have lost people to lung cancer, and the American Cancer Society, in their opinions, has not focused enough of their funding on this disease. My sister, in fact, my whole family, really support the cancer society. Laurianne's hope was that Calem's generation would not have to worry about cancer. She didn't care if it was lung cancer, prostate cancer, breast cancer. It all has to go. Just because you get cancer in one area doesn't mean it won't metastasize into another. My sister's lung cancer developed into a brain tumor. It didn't stay in her lungs. Cancer knows no boundaries, and for this reason, our research dollars should know no boundaries as well. We need to focus on curing all kinds of cancer. It won't bring Mike's mom, Ben Steadman, or my sister back, but it will honor them and save other families from the grief that we have gone through.

I get focused on lung cancer. My sister died from it. It is and will continue to be my primary focus. But it will not be my only focus. Because you never know when, where or who cancer will strike next.

Pat's Web Graphics - Roll cursor over ribbons to see what each represents

Posted by Lynda (Laurianne's Sister) :: 10:10 AM :: 0 people are more aware ---------------------------------------