Commercials

When commercials come on the television or radio and they are about a variety of things relating to medical and or physical conditions, I watch now with a jaundiced eye. Once, many of those commercials directly related to medical conditions I have before the MBC. At the time, I thought my condition so life-altering, that I would listen to the commercials pitching their new drug or cream or device that will alleviate, heal, or make livable whatever is wrong with the person. “Be sure to ask your doctor about… blah blah drug, cream, durable medical equipment.”

So many of those commercials seem trivial now – not to denigrate the condition that would benefit from whatever the commercial is pedaling, but so much of those commercials seem to pander to one’s vanity, or a human’s penchant to being susceptible to suggestion. That’s okay. I was such a person. Just part of being human.

My motto has long been: It could always get worse. I’ve lived by that. Ive put my faith in that. And, voilà, it keeps getting worse. Still, I know, it could get worse than it is. I just don’t want to know what that “worse” might be. I can imagine it. I could research it. These options, to me, are horrendous – the things of nightmares! So I don’t go there!

Did I tell you? Each time an oncologist has said (in words similar to these) to me, “I don’t think you have anything else to worry about now. You have been cancer free for (seven years, and again for nine years) and it looks you are going to stay that way.” Those words have been a curse for me, as each time the oncologist (two different ones) said that to me, within a year, I got a new cancer diagnosis. Tell your oncologist to never say anything like that to you. It has now become a death sentence for me.

Back to commercials. Now, I zero in on commercials about cancer drugs, or cancer hospitals and clinics, and various clinical trials for cancers. I do not want to hear or see these commercials, but just as when you tell a person not to think of the color red, that is all they can see in their mind; the color red.

I’ll be watching a show on television and one of the characters discovers he or she has cancer. Or a member of their family has cancer. Nine times out of ten, they find a cure for that person’s cancer and the world is a happy place again in which to live. I don’t have that happy conclusion. My world is not so jolly a place to live.

These things are inescapable. I wonder how others in my situation deal with it?

I have been handed a death sentence, but I have done nothing to commit the crime. I’ve gone through much to reverse my condition, my sentence: After the first diagnosis: surgery (twice; a year apart) and chemo. After the second diagnosis: Chemo and radiation, with severe consequences. Now, after the third diagnosis: life extending Faslodex shots and chemo drugs for the rest of what remains of my life.

I’m in prison, innocent of any crime that would have convicted me of an offense culminating in a death sentence. But no matter how much I cry out my innocence, it changes nothing. So, except here, on this virtual page, I am silent about it. Too late now to make a difference one way or another. ::shrug::

Back, again, to commercials… How many of you can watch, or even listen to those ASPCA commercials about the puppies and dogs in shelters who need your help? I donate monthly to a number of organizations dedicated to helping animals (especially dogs) in need. I do so freely and with a big heart, in spite of those rip-your-heart-out commercials produced by ASPCA. If I hear that music, or that pleading heart-wrenching voice, I turn the sound off and turn my head, or, I switch channels. Simple as that.

Now, give me those commercials made by Subaru, with the Golden Retriever, Yellow Lab parents and their offspring and I am all ears, eyes, spirit, mind, heart, and soul! They are my FAVORITE commercials! I’ll confess, part of the reason I bought my Subaru Outback was because of Subaru’s dog commercials; true story! Now those commercials make my heart sing! And, my dogs love the car, too. LOL! Great cars, by the way.

Well, this has been another one of those nights/mornings. I’ve been up the whole time. It is 4:40AM and I think I may be able to get some sleep now. Gotta go…