Well, I finally had the opportunity to watch "Crazy, Sexy Cancer."
It left me with some Crazy, Sexy Questions.
Let me start by saying that Kris Carr is clearly a talented artist. Her movie flowed well, was never boring and was pretty to look at.
Kris was diagnosed with an incurable cancer and had 20-something tumors on her liver and lungs. It looked bad. There is no treatment, chemo etc, so she embarks on a journey to find health with diet and yoga. I found the explorations into more "out there" therapies to be funny and something I could relate to. During the course of the movie, she interacts with several "cancer chicks" who are at some stage of treatment--serious chemo and all the effects. (Those people were my favorite part of the movie.) In the end, we discover that Kris' tumors are so slow moving that the doctor suggests that she refer to them as tumors instead of cancer. She never had one day of sickness during the movie's 4 year span.
Here's my question: Am I alone in feeling that a person with an illness which has no symptoms can't really lump themselves into the same bucket as those of us with serious, active illness and treatments?
I found myself getting angry at Carr for being around women who were truly physically suffering and not acknowledging that her level of illness was very different.
I felt angry at her for talking about her diet and crying about her diet and acting as though she was "being positive" in the face of cancer.
I do not deny the psychological effects of a diagnosis like that. I know there is the need for grieving and feeling your fear.
Why though, did I find myself feeling sorry for the sick people watching her movie?
Because I know some people were watching her walk down the aisle in a wedding dress and their hearts were breaking. They would not get to have another moment like that in their life.
I have written about "Competitive Suffering" and I am aware that is what I am doing.
I need to find out, though, what it is that has triggered my feelings of anger towards this woman.
Kriss Carr was on Oprah talking about facing death. My dream is to be on Oprah one day, so I know that I am just plain jealous. However, how does one really talk about facing death without ever spending one day sick in bed?
Am I just being petty?
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There's a really interesting article about near death experiences and the movie Fearless (which, by the way, have you ever seen that movie? it's really good) here: http://www.globalideasbank.org/befaft/B&A-4.HTML
The article claims that it's possible to have a classic near-death experience without ever being physically near death. The certain belief that one is about to die can be enough to trigger a near-death experience. For instance a mountain climber who falls off the side of a mountain, has an NDE on the way down, and then lands in a snowbank, virtually unharmed.
Of course a narrow escape from death isn't at all the same thing as actually having a few seconds or minutes of brain-death from an injury or during an operation. Still, it's something to think about.
I find myself feeling frustrated (to put it mildly) right along with you. I guess it is hard for those of us who have been chronically ill to imagine the sudden pain and shock of being told you have untreatable tumors. So I will grant her that. However, the fact that she has not suffered one day means she has NO IDEA what it is like to be sick and it is insulting for her to act like she can "hang out" and relate to all these women who truly are sick and dying from cancer.
In other words, dealing with the fact that her life will probably be shortened is awful for sure, but has no right (IMHO) to act like she knows what it truly means to be sick.
I thought the same things while I was watching it. I kept waiting for her to get truly sick, like rolling around in bed, throwing up, etc...
I didn't feel she was playing at the same level as the other girls were in movie. They were my favorite part, too.
Choose Right. Choose the Light. Win thy fight. See ya soon Upstairs, girl; see ya in Heaven. In fact, I love you so much, I'd much rather serve you for the length and breadth of eternity. Nevertheless, this is one of our blogs I wrote to try and git the Word-Out about how much I love the female race and, in the Great Beyond, I'll love'm more precisely because a whole universe is waiting for eternity. Join me, miss gorgeous, and lemme fill-us-up to pleasure-beyond-measure. Wanna? Ya gonna? Just to kiss your adorable feets in Heaven would blow-my-mind. Looking forward to it. Love you. See ya soon.
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