Changing the Conversation

My dad doesn’t lose. That’s why I’m committed to changing the conversation around cancer. Photo by Impulse Photography

Preface: This might be a little personal to post here, but as marketers and media professionals, we do have a role in adapting the way people relate to topics and looking at them through a different lens—even tough subjects like cancer, death, and dying.

I found this article in early February, and the headline, “The Problem With the Phrase ‘Beat Cancer,’” immediately grabbed my attention.

Just a few weeks prior, my dad sat in front of me on his hospital bed as the doctor told him he had aggressive glioblastoma. I fought tears, but they puddled in my eyes.

My dad said, “You know what a tough son of a gun I am, and you know I’m going to fight this.”

Soon after, I found myself inundated with well-meaning people citing my dad’s strength—physical, mental, spiritual—and that cancer didn’t stand a chance against Ray Barron. The man who wrestled a bear, had a silver tooth with a dent, wore shorts to every single high school football game he coached in his nearly 50-year career (even in Wyoming blizzards), coached countless young men to be successful in wrestling and in life—his list of credentials as evidence of his strength is endless.

The problem was, this wasn’t a wrestling match where he could come back in the final seconds with a reversal to a pin. Glioblastoma, like many forms of cancer, is unbeatable, no matter how hard the patient fights or how strong he is.

And that’s where the problem lies: My dad doesn’t lose. My dad doesn’t weaken. My dad is never not strong, not brave, not a fighter. He doesn’t give in. Even as we get farther in this cancer journey, he’s not losing his battle. He’s doing the best he can to live the rest of the time he has with dignity and surrounded by people who love him.

As media professionals and marketers, we talk about changing the conversation all the time. We do so to disrupt the status quo, develop new ideas, and push ourselves and our brands to new levels. How do we apply this to the delicate topic of cancer, dying, and death?

I’m committed to finding new ways to talk about life with cancer, living your last months and days with passion, and meeting the end. Because someday we all “lose”, and no one wants to be thought of as having “lost” at life or not fighting to live.