Baldies' Blog began originally in the UK by a 26 year old journalist with a blood cancer on a mission to inform the world about bone marrow donation.

He has since died, and I took on the cause of making cancer care more transparent for everybody.

Cancer is a disease that will touch everybody through diagnosis or affiliation: 1 in 2 men will be diagnosed and 1 in 3 woman will hear those words, "You Have Cancer."

I invite you to read how I feel along my journey and
how I am continuing to live a full life alongside my Hodgkin's lymphoma, with me controlling my cancer, not my cancer controlling me.

I hope that "Baldies' Blog" will prepare you to handle whatever life sends you, but especially if it's the message, "You Have Cancer."

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Monday, December 5, 2011

I don't know what is wrong with me, but whatever I do, which is everything I can do to stop people from having to suffer the way I have, it is never enough. I reach a goal and am only satisfied for a moment, because I remember how hard life has been and is still. I can't rest because I want people to be able to fight their illnesses without fear of losing their homes, bankrupting their families, and becoming homeless from foreclosure. I don't want anyone to ever have to choose between food and medications, cut their dosage in half so it extends longer, or go hungry and get weaker and sicker because they feel the helplessness of not knowing how they'll feed their children. I don't want anybody to feel imprisoned in a relationship that is emotionally and physically destructive because they need insurance. I don't want anyone to have to plead through tears with registrars, physicians, pharmacists, secretaries or nurses to access care or get a life saving medication. I don't want anybody to feel forced to accept treatment that they know through scientific evidence is not the best, most effective, safest treatment available because it is all that is available at the hospital their insurance has dictated is in-network. I want it to be self evident that the constitution states we all have the "right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness," and with health status being the number one determining factor of happiness in people over 50, know that health care is encompassed within these rights. I want it to be self evident that people are more important than profits and that a country is only as strong as its weakest citizen. I want to be able to relax knowing that even if cancer continues to attack every other man and one in three women, that the safest most effective quality care that gives the greatest chance of survival will be available to everybody despite socioeconomic or insurance status. I want to know that people will no longer die from being turned away at ERs, waiting neglected in waiting rooms, or being treated continually for superficial symptoms that any insured person would have diagnosed as life threatening. I want to be able to find a place to stop this list and rest assured that others will be okay, that someone somewhere will make sure others do not suffer as I have, even if it's through a miracle from the hand of God. But until then, until that time comes when people regard people as people regardless of health status, I can't relax. I can't stop fighting or praying that someday these simple wishes for people to care for other people more than all else will come true.
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

As a nurse and a daughter of a father who was diagnosed with lung cancer last year, I hope you know that you are not the only person who hopes for all these things. I cannot even imagine the battles you've undergone, and will still fight; and our current healthcare system is an abomination, and really scary. It is hard not to feel powerless, but you have to know that you are making a difference, even by writing this blog. We can only hope one day healthcare in the US will be less about insurance companies making profits, and more about getting ALL people the care they so deserve.

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