HPV-16 CANCER IS A SNEAK

HPV-16 cancer is on the ballot this time around.

You wouldn’t know it because there’s no hoopla, but it’s there.

Sometimes it’s here, sometimes it’s there, but most of the time it’s a mystery.

But, dear readers, as you know, cancer of any kind is a hard road to travel.

What are my cancer talk credentials, you ask? The usual chemo and radiation for seven weeks.

I started the cancer ball rolling in late 2016 with a lump on my neck I mistook for muscle, a lumpy muscle.

After all the poking and prodding, and doctor’s orders to eat like a horse to pack on weight before the ordeal of the cure, I had my driver’s license renewal..

This is what I had to look at, sparking memories of the time, for the next eight years.

The busy side is on your right. Look like a muscle to you?

For eight years I’ve whipped out my ID with the ‘I’m fucked’ picture.

 

Where HPV-16 Is On The Ballot

Look at any region, any state, commonwealth, territory,  county, township, or jurisdiction that restricts women’s healthcare.

Every instance of neglect in women’s health is a hotbed of HPV-16 cancer risk.

For women and men. That’s right, women and men.

From the Cleveland Clinic:

 

Certain strains of HPV (most often types 16 and 18) can cause changes in the cells of your cervix, a condition called cervical dysplasia.

Left untreated, cervical dysplasia sometimes advances to cervical cancer.

Anyone can become infected with HPV if they have sex or close skin-to-skin genital contact with a partner with the virus.

Similarly, anyone with the virus can spread it to their partner during intercourse, oral sex, anal sex or other close genital contact.

 

Look at the states with the darkest color, the color that indicates a state where abortion is illegal, where women’s health is an after thought.

If you’re a lively young man keeping company with lively young women, things get lively.

If you’re a young married man starting a family, you want your wife to have the best of women’s healthcare, not an excuse.

But, there’s more.

If you are a divorced middle-aged man in the dating pool trolling for your third ex-wife, your hot dates will make a request of you.

This is when that sneaky HPV-16 is on the ballot.

Why give the decisions women make about their healthcare to a legislative body full of old men with little to no knowledge or interest in women’s health.

To them it’s all summed up with, “down there.”

If women’s healthcare is not available, if routine checkups get skipped due to the hassle, then the table is set for HPV-16 cancer in men.

For better outcomes, vote for better people.

 

Is Cancer Too Political

The ordeal of oropharyngeal cancer is enough to break men and women.

I wouldn’t wish it on anyone.

From Yale Medicine:

 

Oropharyngeal cancer is a type of head and neck cancer that affects the middle part of the pharynx called the oropharynx.

Cancer of the oropharynx can occur on the back one-third of your tongue, soft palate, tonsils, and side and back walls of the throat. 

 

What they leave out is you the patient turning into a piece of meat for handlers/doctors to examine, scan, strap down, and with any luck turn you loose no worse for wear.

But you are worse for wear and you need to figure a way to put it behind you.

Not everyone gets that far. They choose their pathology instead of their path.

I’ve been in the  cancer ward, the cancer waiting room, the cancer office, and seen people wracked to hell and back from the treatment.

What I saw was my imminent future.

I turned into a ghost of myself, a stranger in my own skin, and had to do something sooner than later or I’d be stuck there.

I’ve met the ‘stuck’ cancer people:

Man: This is my second time.

Wife: We celebrated with everyone the first time. 

Man: Now we’re more quiet.

 

The Quiet Part Out Loud

I interviewed one doctor who prescribed three different chemos along with a chemo pump to keep the chemo cooking on high.

My second opinion from an OHSU Knight Cancer Institute doctor prescribed one chemo and no pump.

The first guy rolled out the standard treatment for standard neck cancer; the second guy focused on the unique differences between HPV-16 cancer, and cancers associated with smoking and drinking alcohol.

As horrible as I felt after I’d run the gamut on chemo and radiation, the extra chemo would have ruined me the same way it does everyone else.

The radiation burned the neck tumor out, the chemo killed the quickly replicating cancer cells that may have jumped the guardrails.

It was worse than expected, worse than just a sore throat. I got a sore soul.

I felt like I was knocking on heaven’s door, that I was ready to be put in the ground.

The difference was the intervention my wife and kids did before I faded too far away and ended up in the hospital or nursing home.

My loved ones tagged teamed the hell out of me with accusations and challenges and verbal abuse that made me glow with pride.

I hadn’t heard such salty shit since my wrestling coach’s talk after I fell on my back and pinned myself on Senior Night; they were as salty as my Army drill sergeant when he replaced me as platoon leader for not going along with the bullshit.

Cancer is a motherfucker no one should have to endure, let alone die from.

 

Protecting women’s health is protecting men’s health.

While you scan your ballot, whether young, old, or in between, ink in the spots associated with women’s healthcare.

Those are the people with a taste for a better future.

Women’s healthcare is the foundation of a world power.  Make it so.

Please note that I’m not selling a product, hawking a potion, or advocating for some radical agenda.

But I am asking women to vote for a better life.

I’m asking men to vote for the women in their lives.

This is my ‘DO SOMETHING’ blog post.

What are you doing?