Historically, we humans have worried about death throughout our history.
We think that animals do not worry about it because they don't comprehend it.
So we of all living creatures seem to have the capacity to know that death is inevitable for us all - whether we have cancers or not - and so we fear it.
What have we as homo sapiens sapiens done about it over the centuries?
We have looked for ways to cheat death or soften the prospect of death.
Egyptian pharaohs built pyramids to cheat death.
The Christian religion gained many adherents because it promised the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting.
That is a comforting thought.
~2 billion people on earth call themselves Christians, another 1.4 billion Muslims.
Muslims also seek eternal life after death - they recognize the same God as Christians but with a different prophet.
These are human coping mechanisms.
Over 2000 of my patients died with or from their cancers.
There were similarities, but each one handled approaching death in his or her own way, and the loved ones left behind handled the loss in their own ways - sometimes with religious beliefs and many with an inner strength they didn't know they had. Support groups are good for unity and strength in developing coping skills.
In some cases death became a welcome release from the process of dying. From all of the suffering I have seen in my years as a cancer and leukemia doctor, the conclusion I have reached for myself is that being dead is easy, peaceful. It's dying that's hard. I've seen many people die. They look much more peaceful in death than they did in the last vestiges of life.
People - my patients - would ask me, "Am I terminal?"
I would answer that we all are terminal.
For all I know I could be gone in a car accident before tomorrow.
For those who considered themselves Christians, I'd recommend Matthew 6:34 where Jesus tells people not to worry about tomorrow.
Focus on dealing with each day.
With this reasoning it makes sense to make the best of each day.
None of us KNOW with certainty how many days we will have
- whether we have a cancer diagnosis or not.
There are few relative certainties in life. One is that no human has ever gotten out of it alive. So, indeed, fulfill each day.
Added thoughts regarding people who have had a cancer diagnosis.
I suspect that before people are diagnosed with a type of malignancy, they see death as far off in distant time. From years of people thinking that cancer was always a death sentence, we have developed the idea that our days are numbered once we have this diagnosis. I have seen many people treated successfully for cancers - then die from another unrelated medial problem. Physicians and nurses are doing much better in treating cancer these days. Sometimes we only control them and buy time - hopefully quality time. But we do not actually cure high blood pressure or diabetes either. And there is no cure for the normal aging process.
I once saw a 96 year old person with an advanced malignancy of the GI tract. I suggested that chemotherapy would likely do more harm than good - make her miserable and not add to her life. The family looked at me incredulously and said, "She's lived 96 years, she can't die now." It struck me that no matter how many years we are able to survive, it will never be enough to suit some of us.
For thousands of years up until ~ 1700 AD, the life expectancy at birth hovered at 30 years. Of course that is partly because half of babies did not live to be five years old.
But even after making age five, a human was lucky to make age 40. 100 years ago in the USA, the life expectancy at birth was 47 years. Many people did not live long enough to get cancers which are far more common in people over age 50. I wonder if we will ever be satisfied that we have lived long enough. Probably not. It's very human of us to wish to live as long as possible.