Thread: When I was 19, I had a rare cancer called #chordoma. It's a particularly relentless disease. I was told not to expect a curative intervention. I expected to live for 7 years (partially due to statistical misinterpretation.)
That was 14 years ago.
Since then, I have...
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Finished undergrad at
@umd / Read hundreds of books / Been to enough live music shows that I can't remember them all / Found inspiration in unlikely places / Had depression find me in likely ones / Felt alienated and lonely /1 reply 0 retweets 3 likesShow this thread -
Felt connected to large group of friends and a wonderful family / Lost some friends to the cancer I had / Lost some friends to other diseases / Lost some friends to accidents / Lost some friends to the slow drift introduced by distance in time, space, and personal growth /
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Made some new friends / Spent a solid part of my twenties regrettably wasted on Friday and Saturday nights / Done some other things I regret / Fallen in love / Fallen out of love / Experienced Heartbreak / Been part of welcoming my sister's son into the world /
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Fallen in love again / Gotten engaged. I never embraced "Carpe Diem." I think it's a vapid sentiment usually uttered by people who live charmed lives. Instead, this is just a taste of things that happened along the way. The experiences that accrete as life progresses.
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I bring this up because that's what the health care debate is really about. The
@GOP (and a lot of liberals) focus on actuarial and accounting details to deflect attention from the reality: denying health care denies people a future filled with experiences worth having -- a life.1 reply 0 retweets 2 likesShow this thread -
But, I also think sometimes the conversation about health care (and other social issues) doesn't move forward partially because it's natural to feel a visceral compulsion to deny the recognition of your inevitable illness and need entry into your imagination. I really get that.
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The period of treatment is horrible. I've tried explaining it before but thanks to Stranger Things upside down I have a pretty clear way to convey it now: it feels like your trapped in the upside down. It really is a place apart from reality. But denial doesn't work.
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And providing health care to everyone isn't about scalpels and syringes. It's about saving the wealth of a person's future experiences. Every argument about cost is an asshole coming upon a car crash with a bleeding victim and saying, "Sorry but I have really nice leather seats."
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