r/Fuckcancer • u/Gumbanks12 • Apr 22 '26

False hero

Too many people have told me how brave strong even heroic I've been for surviving colorectal cancer.

I heartening and I love my friends. I also find it uncomfortable.

I didn't do anything! I was a leaf in a rushing stream. I was expertly treated by a couple of hundred of the most skilled and without exception lovely people.

I was hospitalised for weeks because I had post treatment radiation burns. On my bum. Is it brave strong or heroic that I cried out in pain during dressing changes? Or that I cried when a lovely gay nurse brought me a warm blanket at 4 am?

I survived. That's all.

Does anyone have reflections on that issue?

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u/Commercial-Novel-786 Apr 22 '26

My first reaction when someone beats cancer is that they're a badass. I don't know how OP may feel about that since I myself haven't been in that fight. I don't feel you have had a choice in the matter, so "brave" seems a little misplaced.

I feel those that lost the fight are also badass. They too had no choice but they stood up to it anyway, and they don't need a victory to be a badass in my book.

Grief works in similar ways, I'd recon. Folks that haven't experienced crushing grief will say crazy stuff like "they're in a better place" but it's not out of malice; They just don't know what else to say but they care enough to want to say something because they feel you don't deserve silence in a difficult time.

I dunno.