CANCER – A challenge, not a curse

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I was yet a small child in our rural barrio when Mano Tinong became the topic of anxious discussions in the neighborhood. He had this bulge at his neck area that was growing rather fast. Even liquid food soon became difficult for him to swallow.

The municipal doctor was not called in, until it was already too late. The family was sure they knew what Mano Tinong's ailment was. They believed it was a jinx inflicted by a known barángan (sorcerer) in our area.

In just a few months, the fully grown bulge broke open. It smelt so bad that the close neighbors had to cover their noses for days. The sanitary inspector also came regularly to spray disinfectant around the house to tone down the stench.

When the old man finally died, his coffin was generously dusted with powdered táwas (alum) supposedly to contain the odor. But even with the bad smell suppressed, neighbors still hesitated to come to the wake, for fear of contracting the disease. The funeral was scheduled hurriedly.

The scare lingered still. The municipal doctor had to assure the people that it was not a contagious disease. It was cancer of the throat.

Mano Tinong was a chronic smoker. He always had a roll of tobacco in his mouth. It was his constant companion at work in the crop field, a habit that made a subsistence farmer's difficult life a little bit tolerable.

It was a time when only very few had cancer, and too little was yet known of the disease. It was seen as a most dreadful curse, so dreadful that many thought it could only be caused by some supernatural, evil powers. People didn't know that they could cause cancer in themselves.

There is a contention within the medical circles that everybody is a potential cancer victim. They say that our bodies inherently contain cancer cells, and that we ourselves can incite these cells to develop into a full-blown disease. We do it, they explain, by bad nutrition and unhealthy habits.

I remember that back in Mano Tinong's time, the other smokers in our small rural community did not relent in their harmful habit despite witnessing his frightening fate. Today, cancer is a much more common malady. It seems the disease is really as difficult a lesson to learn as an enemy to beat, even with all the present anti-cancer advocacies.

I myself would occasionally reach for a cigarette, although I know that such infrequent act can actually start a habit. Many women won't do self-breast-examination; they find it awkward. Many people won't see a doctor for a health checkup; it costs money.

Even with public health institutions where a checkup – and sometimes even medication – is free, many of us still won't go; we don't have time. We have all the time for watching TV or for nasty gossip with the neighbors, but not a mere hour or so for our own wellbeing. To think that we only need to undergo a health checkup every once in a while.

We tend to feel that a health problem can only hit others – but never us. We feel invincible, until our own reckless ways begin to take their toll on our health. In the end, our overconfidence becomes our biggest remorse.

The human genetic design is said to include a feature for self-destruction. For instance, in time our bodies just wear out, no matter how careful we are or how hard we try to maintain our health. Maybe we have an innate predisposition towards ailments, too, like what the medical scholars say that our bodies already carry cancer cells from birth.

Fortunately, we are also endowed with the innate capacity to face up to our alleged natural flaw. We need to start checking our diets and lifestyles. We need to change our ways, if need be, in order to lessen the possibility of getting cancer or, for that matter, any disease.

We owe it to ourselves to try hard to ward off illnesses; to try harder perhaps, given the increasingly unhealthy conditions that suffuse our environment these days. Or, where an ailment is inevitable, to make our discomfort an eye-opener for others.

One breast-cancer survivor amazes me. She doesn't let her illness slow her down; in fact, she is busier now organizing various outreach projects and cancer information drives. She says, "My cancer is my challenge, not my curse."