The appointment with the oncologist was a complete waste of his time and ours. He was as cold as the room and almost robotic in his speech. He had given that same speech far too many times before and did not see me as a person, as a woman who needed reassurance. I was another patient, another person to be placed on the cancer conveyor belt. He had not yet even seen my complete pathology report and was already telling me I needed chemo, surgery and radiation, in that order. He ticked off statistics to me, one after the other. He could have been reading the ticker tape of the day’s prices at the stock exchange.

It was only when I told him I did not believe in chemo, that his demeanor changed. I told him I had already seen too many people die from chemo. I shared that I firmly believed we needed a healthy immune system in order to heal cancer and since chemo killed our immune system it seemed counterproductive. It was then he came out of his own trance and looked at me like I had grown a third eye out of my forehead and I saw his nurse give signs of a fleeting smile on her face. He shook his head at me and told me I’d change my mind once the cancer started growing out of control, that I would be back to see him in a very short time and would regret my decision to wait.

I was told in no uncertain terms that I had to do what he said, I had to do it immediately and, if I didn’t, that I would be dead within the year. On the positive side, he said that if I did what he told me to do, he could probably assure me of a good five more years of life.  Either way, he was saying I was going to die.