This is my favorite exchange from the process of diagnosis and treatment. It’s Tuesday, May 26th and I have just had an ultrasound of the liver. The doctors have left the room to check how soon they can perform the liver biopsy, leaving me and the physician’s assistant alone in the room. Silence does not bother me, so I say nothing. In a desperate attempt to create small talk the PA says, “So, do you have any big plans for the summer?” I laugh out loud and say, “I do now. I’m going to beat cancer.” She gasps and begins trying to get her question back into her mouth. I tell her it’s fine and thank her for helping me to look at it this way, which I hadn’t until that very moment.

“Cancer picked the wrong body.”
“Cancer is going to get its a** kicked.”
“Cancer doesn’t stand a chance.”

These are all statements that have flown out of my mouth and fingers since diagnosis. About seven days ago, I thought about them and I thought they are so very confident. Perhaps even overconfident considering how little Kath and I really know. We are gathering information, studying, and learning so we can be active participants in my treatment, but let’s be honest, there is more that we don’t know than there is what we do.

I began wondering if the confidence that I feel and exude was actually a form of denial. Was I in some way projecting positivity to avoid consideration of the potential negative outcomes? See how I said, “negative outcomes?” So, to prove to you that I’m not in denial, I’ll tell you that I know darn well that people die from stage four non-small cell adenocarcinoma. Lots of them, every year. They die. I get it. Kath and I have talked about it many times. But just because THEY die doesn’t mean I die. Which is why we don’t look at statistics and populations. I am not a patient in a population of 1,000 or 10,000. I am me, one of one, a unique patient with his own team and medical and integrative treatment program. Their outcome is their outcome. My outcome is mine and mine alone.

Let’s get back to the question of confidence or denial. The answer came just a few days later when Kath and I were reading Radical Remission. This book is truly a gift. Thank you, Nelson Williams. It takes a scientific research-based look at thousands of patients who have beaten cancer against all statistical probabilities, using methods in addition to or beyond western medical science. The ninth and final factor the author looks at is “Having strong reasons to live.” Before we got to that chapter, I joked many times about how we could skip over it because I already have the needle pinned on that one. How many would you like me to list? Fortunately, Kathleen did not skip it and we read it together this week. There is a section in the chapter called Confidence From Your Core. I’ll quote the first sentence. “Radical Remission survivors and alternative healers emphasize that a person’s desire to live has to come from the deepest core of his or her being, and it has to be unquestioning.” And there’s my answer.

The previously mentioned confident statements are genuine and natural and real to me. They come from my TOTAL BELIEF in what my medical science team is doing, what my nutrition program is doing, what all the prayers are doing, what love is doing, what meditation and exercise are doing, etc.

And as I was taught at the age of 17, “Anything the mind of man can conceive and believe it can achieve.” Believe … with total confidence.