Mr./Madam Toastmaster, fellow Toastmasters, and most welcome guests. When I say "The Devil," I mean the embodiment of evil. There are many evils in the world – war, famine, terrorism, the list goes on and on. But, one of the worst evils in my opinion is Cancer. The "Big C." With cancer, The Devil is absolutely indiscriminate. Cancer targets every country in the world, every race, every religion, men, and women alike. There are around 200 different types of cancer that can affect the human body. Statistics show that breast cancer alone will affect 1 in every 8 women in the United States. That's a lot of evil.
I visualize it this way. The Devil lurks in a dark, stinky corner just out of sight. From there he randomly chooses his victims. Once you're chosen, it's a done deal. At that point, it's only a matter of how badly he'll attack you.
A friend of mine, Jack, was chosen by The Devil, who was in a particularly bad mood. Jack was diagnosed with Melanoma, the worst type of skin cancer, which is caused mainly by overexposure to the UV rays in sunlight. It's the worst because it can metastasize; the mutant cells can spread to other parts of the body. Bad news. I say Jack's attack was particularly bad because, even though metastasis only occurs in less than 20% of Melanoma cases, it happened to Jack. I could just see The Devil's coming from his dark hiding place, sneaking up from behind, and BOOM! It only took one shot to throw Jack into a war that, even though he won a few battles, he ultimately lost. Honestly, he never stood a chance. It only took 18 months from the time Jack was diagnosed until we attended his memorial service. It was a sad day.
Another friend of mine, Jerry, was also chosen, but his time, for whatever reason, The Devil was in a much better mood. Jerry was diagnosed with prostate cancer, which will occur in over 11% of all males in the United States. In this case, Jerry was screened for his cancer, and after discovering it, was able to start treatment quickly. It was by no means easy; it was a long, hard fought battle that included daily radiation therapy. Here, I envision The Devil in the form of a Hockey player on a mission. If you are not familiar with Hockey, fighting is actually legal. Think The Devil had anything to do with that?? If the boys want to go at it, the refs let ‘em. The rules say they can wail away at each other, but if either one falls to the ice, it's all over. This time, The Devil picks a fight with Jerry, then gets the upper hand and holds him just off the ice, pounding away. But Jerry never "fell to the ice." He was able to escape, and is still very much with us today.
When the Devil chose me, well, he must have really had a hard night. On the day my doctor told me my diagnosis, he asked me to, "Sit down…" Oh, this can NOT be good. He said I had a form of "Cutaneous T-Cell Lymphoma." What?! He explained that "Cutaneous" means "having to do with the skin," a "T-Cell" lymphocyte is a type of white blood cell, and "Lymphoma" implies some kind of cell mutation. It's a very scary way of saying that mutant white blood cells, that are a part of my body's normal immune system, invaded my skin. I don't have skin cancer; I have cancer on my skin. When The Devil slithered out to take a swing at me, he darn near misses, because although there is no cure for this form of cancer, it's also non-communicable, non-hereditary, and non-metastatic. It requires no chemotherapy and instead of radiation, it requires "irradiation." Ironically, the best way to battle this type of cancer is to bombard it with, guess what, UV light, the very cause of Melanoma. In other words, the best treatment for this relatively mild form of cancer could, in fact, cause a much worse one. That's a very clever Devil!
Jack paid the ultimate price to The Devil. Jerry got the crap beat out of him by The Devil, but survived. And me? How lucky was I? I only brushed cheeks with The Devil.
Mr./Madam Toastmaster.