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Academic

: Less than the Least

Still More Cancer, and Hope--Stuntz

By David Skeel and Bill Stuntz

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Last week, my oncologist told me the results of the latest set of films: I appear to have a cluster of four small tumors on the left side of my abdomen, and one slightly larger tumor on my liver. My cancer is back, and in two places: a bad sign. I've started chemo again, and am feeling the usual symptoms, including constant queasiness and others too gross to describe in a family blog. My prognosis isn't clear, but at this point, the range of plausible outcomes—see how easy it is to talk about the timing of one's death?—runs from bad to worse. Still, sometimes improbable things happen; the disease itself is example enough of that phenomenon. Maybe my chemo will shrink these tumors, and buy me some time. I hope so, though I don't assume so—and I try not to think too hard about the 'hope' part of that sentence.

That last clause may sound strange, but then hope is a strange commodity. I have heard from more people than I can count that, above all else, the thing I must do (channeling my inner Jesse Jackson here) is to keep hope alive. Don't give up hope. Don't quit: battle your cancer as long and as hard as you can, believe that you can and will beat it. Keep hoping and the victory can be yours.

Only it usually doesn't work that way. My cancer is not subject to my will—nor to my doctors', for that matter. Even if optimism is correlated with longer life (and there is some evidence for that proposition), the idea that hope produces the object hoped for remains false for most of us, most of the time. My cancer will do what it chooses—it seems to me an intelligent but demonic force—or what God chooses, not what I choose. My sovereignty doesn't extend that far.

Which is OK by me. 'Keep hope alive' amounts to the belief that I can control the outcomes in my life. Think about that for a moment, and you'll see that it's a terrible responsibility. I don't want it. Much better to say: Forces beyond my control usually dictate my life's circumstances, good and bad (and in my life to date there has been far more good than bad: few in this sad world have less reason for bitterness than I do). The most I can do is decide how to behave in the midst of them. That's more than enough. So I'll do my best to do my job, to care for my family, and to be faithful to my God. That too is more than enough. I prefer to place my hope in more secure things than my own very limited power.

Full post as published by Less than the Least on August 07, 2009 (boomark / email).