USING CANCER MANAGEMENT AS A SURVIVAL TOOL

I spent many winters doing battle with the squirrels, and every time I sought to thwart them, they found ways to slip past my defenses. What does this have to do with cancer management?

Think about how much energy it takes to wage war with an enemy that can maneuver through tight spaces, can outwit your best efforts, and that can jump long distances. I wasted more time at the window, waiting for the squirrels to arrive, so I could attempt to frighten them away. The truth is that I had little real impact on these rodents with attitude. They still arrived in droves. They still found ways to get the bird seed. I can't tell you the number of times the feeder poles were bent, the feeders were sent crashing to the ground, and the seed was lost. In the end, the very birds I wanted to feed were the ones who suffered the most. They were frightened away by my squirrel-chasing antics. They lost out when the squirrels took over their feeding ground.

What's the solution to the squirrel situation? As you can see by the photos, the pole is still bent in the winter snow. The reality is that I had to learn to manage the squirrels in a reasonable way. Oh, don't get me wrong. They still get the bird seed. They still climb onto the feeders and they try to get as much as they can. But now I have ways to feed the birds that circumvent the squirrels.

I have a squirrel-proof feeder on a nearby tree limb. This is for the birds when the squirrels are taking over the pole feeders. The birds don't like this feeder as much, but it allows them to still feed when they are blocked on the feeder. I also have a thistle feeder for the little song birds, something the squirrels aren't interested in accessing. One of the pole feeders is easy for the squirrels to get at, and they do. They shake the seed onto the ground below and have their little feasts. And then there is the "squirrel cage" feeder, designed to prevent them from accessing the seed. Does it work? Sometimes. As long as the squirrels can get some seed from the easy feeder, however, they tend to leave this one alone.

You might not think so, but I have actually cut down the amount of seed I use for the birds and squirrels. That's what squirrel management can do. Am I admitting defeat by allowing them to get at some of the seed? Not really. I am acknowledging that I cannot control all of them, but I can control the amount of energy I expend and how I expend it.

Cancer management is a lot like that. Should you waste your time putting all of your energy and attention on curing the cancer? Or should you use the time to direct the energy and attention to the life you and your loved one want to live? It's really about quality of life, more than quantity. It's about conserving resources and improving the ways to use the resources.

In cancer treatment, there are things you can control and should control. But there are also things that will happen over which you have little control. Changing your focus allows you to meet the important needs of cancer patients in meaningful ways. When you direct your energy towards using the life you and your loved one have to pursue good times, you lessen the direct impact of bad times. You accept that bad things can happen to good people, so you look for the opportunities to find the goodness that's available.

The truth is we can't always change our circumstances, but we can change how we live within those confines, and in doing so, we take control over the quality of the lives we live. It's our decision, not cancer's.