Note: This post is not intended
to reflect my views on gun control or gun owner rights…it is to merely serve as
an analogy to make my point.
A gun was pointed right at you.
The eyes of the gunman were wild and stared into your soul. You glanced at the gun and saw his trigger
finger curl. Then there was the
deafening sound. There was no way you
could completely dodge the bullet.
There are a few scenarios that could have played out from this
scene. Let’s count them down from worst
to best.
4. The bullet inflicted a severe wound and you had an 85% chance of
dying. The internal damage was extensive
and you likely suffered a painful death.
3. The bullet inflicted significant damage to a major organ and you
were in intensive care and watched closely.
You still had a 60% chance of dying.
If you didn’t die, the recovery process was slow, painful and expensive.
2. The bullet hit no vital organs but you were still hurt quite
significantly. You may have gone through
rehabilitation and suffered permanent scarring.
Chances are that you lived, but you may have limitations later in life…not
only physical, but mental and emotional.
The image of your experience will never go away.
1. The bullet hit your arm or leg, but didn’t cause major damage. You required some minor surgery and ended up
with scarring, but there was no danger at loss of life. You will, however remain emotionally scarred.
0. The bullet barely grazed you.
You had no physical evidence of being hurt except for maybe a scratch,
but you may wake up from your sleep with nightmares of your experience.
Of these five results, would you claim that any is not a victim of an
armed assault? My guess is no. Whether you died or you were barely touched
by the bullet, the morning headline would still most likely read, “One Person Shot.” You would indeed be a victim.
So why is it that someone with Stage IV melanoma (who has only a 15%
chance of surviving) is deemed as a melanoma warrior or survivor, but those
diagnosed Stage 0 or Stage I are told they can’t be considered the same?
Sure, the higher stage diagnosis involves a LOT more heartache, pain,
treatment and money spent. No one would
ever dispute that a Stage 4 warrior suffers far more than a Stage I
patient. But anyone…ANYONE…who is told “you
have cancer” has seen that gun barrel pointed right at their chest. They’ve seen the wild eyes of a killer
face-to-face. They’ve realized that they
have a very real chance of something going very bad. Perhaps hearing those words…”you have cancer”…is
what defines a warrior. It’s what
defines a survivor.
There is one difference between the analogy comparing an armed assault
victim to a melanoma patient. The gun
victim may never have to experience such an encounter again. The melanoma warrior has a 1 in 3 chance of
the melanoma coming back. And in the
case of my low-stage diagnosed brother, it came back to kill him 6 years later.
