Mom, Boy Who Fled Cancer Treatment Found

cbsnews ^ | May 25, 2009

[brytlea]

Yes, around 1900 the average lifespan in the US was around 47 years old. I don’t care how you live your life, but you’re simply wrong to say that modern medicine hasn’t extended lives. My grandfather died at age 30 from pneumonia before the advent of antibiotics. He likely would have lived today. All you really have to do is read a little and you can see that many people are saved every single year by modern medicine. Modern diets do have some problems, however if they were killing us, we would all be dead. I’m not.

[freedumb2003]

>>I was told if I stopped the chemo treatment I would be dead in six months, that was August 1987.<<

Cancer treatment is light-years ahead of where it was 20+ years ago. Survival rates are much higher ad treatment side-effects infinitesimal compared to were back then. And it was truly ghastly back then when it was still in its infancy — you don’t have to tell me.

Glad to see you made it and I would never double guess your decision. But you did make it as an adult (I assume?)

I understand your emotional reaction to this but I do think it needs to be looked at as highly effective treatment and compared to others for proper analysis.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

I don’t know.

[svcw]

You are correct that the average longevity was around 47 years old. It is not that people did not live long, the average is low because of child deaths before one year of age.
I have a medical book from 1899, that says you can except to lose half of the children you have before the age of five. I can not even imagine that pain.
However, if you survived past five you had a good chance of a long life.

[ozarkgirl]

As a greatgrandmother, you have every right to choose any course of treatment.

As a mother of a 13 year old child with a 90% success rate in the course of treatment, you are obligated to go with the 90% success rate.

To do less than follow the treatment is to kill your child. In this case, you must choose life.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

So what did you do?

[editor-surveyor]

"My husband had pancreatic cancer, went through chemo and radiation and is still here 3 yrs later."

Fortunate so far (1-2% chance) but will he be here 15 years from now? Medical establishment considers living just 5 years to be a cure.

"His cancer would have killed him without medical treatment."

Without any intervention, likely, but there are better modalities that have higher success rates, and less suffering, but when they work, as they mostly do, the establishment refuses to recognize it as a cure, no matter how long they survive. They will waffle and say that it was a mis-diagnosis, or say that it was "just a remission." (and they dare call that 'science.')

[DJ MacWoW]

Not vague at all. You believe them and I’ll be skeptical.

[DJ MacWoW]

I’m reading teh court transcript and it says that the first chemo treatment caused a clot in his left arm and they were afraid it would hit his heart or brain. Would you want chemo again?

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

That would depend on the alternatives. I'm trying to educate myself on all the best alternatives. You're quite right at my age, it is not so important.

That is why when my 20 something grandson had testicular cancer, it becomes a big deal.

[freedumb2003]

>>Not vague at all. You believe them and I’ll be skeptical.

Like I asked, which point or issue does the skepticism apply to?

[DJ MacWoW]

Where do the Founding Fathers give government the right to control you and your family. It isn’t Maybe under the part about Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness. That gives you the right to be free from government interference.

[svcw]

Oh, come on. The chemicals given for my stage ovarian cancer are the same today as it was twenty years ago. Chemo was not in its infancy twenty years ago.
Were my reactions and side effects bad you betcha, did I think they would be no. I was told by the doctors that I would have few if any side effects, that I would probably be able to keep on working. WRONG!
Each persons reaction is different and the doctors do not know how or how sever the reaction will be. Chemo is intended to kill the cancer, it in short poisons you while they try not and kill you in the process.

[Caramelgal]

He is tired of the chemo that doesn’t seem to be working and wanted to end it to live the best he could with what time he had left.

Do you just make things up as you type??

A lot of folks around here are guilty of that. :),

As I understand the kid had only one round of chemo treatment which was working, but which his mother was against from the very beginning and had told him was poisonous and would kill him and that the so called “traditional Native American” treatments, whatever the Hell that is, would cure him. She also told him he was a “shaman” and could cure himself. He’s 13 years old and learning disabled so of course he believes her. He’s not competent to make an informed decision and evidently, neither is his mother.

When the kid felt bad after the first chemo, the mother pulled the “See I told you so” and convinced him to refuse further treatment and even to act out and become physically violent when getting treatment from the doctors and nurses who were trying to save his life.

His cancer, when first diagnosed had a 90% to 95% cure rate. Very good odds when it comes to cancer. But his mother has consigned him to a prolonged and painful death by withholding treatment. The last x-ray, the one the judge ordered shows he now has a large mass in his chest that doctors say, and even his father confirms, is now very painful.

The sad thing in this case is that the delay of competent medical treatment may have made further treatments irrelevant. Very sad!

[DJ MacWoW]

So, we don’t know what the father’s viewpoint is?

Apparently.

[Caramelgal]

Can you get into any thread of depth without getting into personal attacks on other freeprs? Your performance on this thread says not.

Can I presume you are pointing your comments to editor-surveyor?

[DJ MacWoW]

Well now, have you read anywhere in the AP story that the kid got a clot from chemo that could kill him?

[freedumb2003]

>>Each persons reaction is different and the doctors do not know how or how sever the reaction will be. Chemo is intended to kill the cancer, it in short poisons you while they try not and kill you in the process.<<

My observation has been that it wasn’t as awful for my brother and friends as it was for you. And you did go into it a bit before deciding to opt out. And you were in a position to make that decision for yourself.

An anecdote just doesn’t undermine a 90% survival rate.

[DJ MacWoW]

I have read most of the transcript of the boy’s testimony and he got a clot from the chemo treatment that a nurse told him could hit his heart or brain and kill him. He was also too weak to walk for 2 weeks. No wonder the kid said “No more”.

[freedumb2003]

>>
Can I presume you are pointing your comments to editor-surveyor?<<

He meant me. He is a stalker and stalks be on this and other boards. He hangs on my every word and even captures them to quote out of context in other threads, against all rules on almost every board on the Internet.

Note his first post was about me and nothing to do with the OP.

He’s mostly harmless.