Lenondre King

Professor Gina Ryder

FIQWS 10113 – MED4

October 6, 2019

 

The Reason to Fight?

Metaphors are more than just literary devices to compare two subjects. They are powerful forms of art that can influence the reader on how something is understood. For example, “Life is  a journey” is one commonly used. It promotes the idea of how the road you’re on to your destined place may include challenges that test your courage, faith, strengths, and weaknesses. Metaphors help explain otherwise implicit relationships and affects society’s view on a range of topics. Sontag uses her story of chemotherapy for breast cancer in a different approach. She uses various descriptions of cancer to show how cancer illustrates defeat and repression. The writers of “Cancer as Metaphor” discuss one example of medicinal metaphors and elaborates on how patients must endure cancer with a fighting spirit. Both texts seem to approach the idea of military medicinal metaphors being overused, as they won’t get every person through their own battle.

Illness as Metaphor and Aids and its Metaphors is a narrative about a Susan herself reflecting on her time of being a cancer patient. She describes the effects of metaphors being used to describe illness, such as cancer, in which they deprive and add suffering to patients, inhibiting them from getting proper treatment.

In Sontag’s Illness as Metaphor and Aids and its Metaphors, there is value of the quote “Chemotherapy is chemical warfare, using poisons”. She uses the “poisons” to express how the treatment is meant to kill cancer cells, but that isn’t always the case as cancer cells may find their way back. A study in 2006 promised some cancer patients they will benefit from undergoing post-surgery chemotherapy. Five years after treatment, 47% of those who got chemo were still alive. The five-year survival rate was 39% among those who did not undergo chemo. This correlates to the use of metaphor in medicine because, the doctor may provide false hope through the suggestion of chemotherapy. Furthermore, the dictionary definition of warfare is described as the way in which the hostility(war) is conducted. Describing chemotherapy as a chemical warfare portrays the idea that you’re playing fire with fire. Doctors suggesting chemotherapy to help patients with cancer is inadequate as it isn’t the true cure for cancer, and it may add unnecessary stress and pressure on the patient, inhibiting their success rate. In addition, Sontag later discusses how “it is impossible to avoid damaging or destroying healthy cells”, meaning chemotherapy can not only end but cause cancer. This begs the question how do you justify and encourage a patient to undergo chemotherapy, as does the end justify the means. Should a patient subjectify themselves to a potential life filled experiments that may result in a condition worse than the cancer coming back, such as depression, loneliness, etc?

Cancer as Metaphor is an article about the impact cancer patient, Kenneth B. Schwartz left on many. His story resulted in the development of a nonprofit organization to dedicate their time in effort in ways of supporting and advancing compassionate health care delivery. The organization has a monthly forum in which caregivers reflect on patients, families, issues, and gain knowledge on how to provide better support for future patients. The metaphor “War on Cancer” expresses that the illness, being cancer is something worth fighting for. However, attracting the patient by equalizing the importance of “fighting with words and healing could be a challenge”. Doctors talk to patients about fighting and winning the war against cancer, but that invokes a psychological burden that may affect the patients hope in the long run. As time goes on through the cancer treatment, whether it be days, months, or years, the patients will to fight may run thin, ultimately making them lose the war. Even if they do beat cancer, the event of it coming back may destroy their will to fight this war, and multiple wars that life will through at them in the long run.

Throughout the text you have people of different professions discussing their opinions on the use of the military metaphor in the healing process based on past experience. An oncologist says the war on cancer is too commonly used because, not all patients are going to feel safe, considering their putting themselves in a “warzone”. For example, some patients think of the cancer as a journey instead, meaning they view their treatment of their cancer as a series of ups and downs, rather than something they have to kill or be killed. As a result, you beg to question how to encounter a patient when their perspective is different from yours? A psychiatrist discusses the idea that we hope the metaphor for us works for the patient as well. We can’t overuse the metaphor because, as doctors we can’t assume we have that connection with our patients from the beginning, but have to establish and build that relationship. One way we could do this is by asking the patient if they “picture what you are saying, in what way they are thinking about it and how it works for them”. In other words, let them describe their conditions/feelings, and you’ll be able to derive the proper metaphor to use in the situation, rather than just suggesting for them to fight their illness. A psychologist in the article discusses his use of the military metaphor and says how its use has gone on way to long. Most patients he’s encountered, ranging from ages 14 to 50, all have the same reaction to the military metaphor, being depressed and lonely. After a while, his reaction was “I get it; I know you’re screwed. I am with you”. If that is prolonged both the patient and the caregiver start to” sense some despair and loss of hope”.

In both works “Cancer as Metaphor” and “Illness as Metaphor and Aids and its Metaphors”, both writers put heavy emphasis on war as a metaphor. They both discuss the idea of how most professions in the medical field discuss cancer being a “war” that must be battled. This can cause stigma because, wars could be indeed lost, and won. The idea of giving false hope to a patient can cause destruction to the faith, ultimately leading to give up in the midst of the war. Although chemotherapy is one of keeping one alive it’s not necessarily allowing one to win the war, but endure it, and most patients obviously don’t want to endure cancer much longer than the already have. This leads me to conclude that military metaphors should not be instilled on children, but only mature adults. The use of military metaphors may cause more damage on a children’s life as they will grow up viewing their whole life as a fight because, a more knowledgeable being told them.

The use of metaphors in medicine provide powerful statements that can impact the patient, the family, and the caregiver psychologically. Both texts provide a statement of how cancer is something worth fighting for, but the comparison of cancer to a war is not going to get every patient through that battle. Every patient has different needs, physically and mentally and the mental support of making them think their illness is a fight shouldn’t be the only thing a caregiver can say about their illness.

 

 

 

 

Works Cited

DeNoon, Daniel J. “Is Chemo Worth it? New Test May Tell”. WebMD Health News. 2006. https://www.webmd.com/lung-cancer/news/20060906/is-chemo-worth-new-test-may-tell

 

Penson, Richard, Schlapira, Lidia, Daniels, Kristy, Chablner, Bruce, and Lych Jr, Thomas. “Cancer as Metaphor”. The Oncologist November 2004 vol. 9 no. 6 708-716. doi: 10.164/theoncologist.9-6-708

 

Sontag, Susan. 1990. “Illness as Metaphor and Aids and its Metaphors”. New York, NY: Anchor.