This article rang a bell with me as it deals with how Robert Ebert is coping with the aftermaths of surgery for jaw cancer that had spread from his thryoid. He is still battling.
Esquire Cancer Ebert One part that echoed my own feelings:
[quote] Roger Ebert can�t remember the last thing he ate. He can't remember the last thing he drank, either, or the last thing he said. Of course, those things existed; those lasts happened. They just didn't happen with enough warning for him to have bothered committing them to memory � it wasn't as though he sat down, knowingly, to his last supper or last cup of coffee or to whisper a last word into Chaz's ear.
The doctors told him they were going to give him back his ability to eat, drink, and talk. But the doctors were wrong, weren't they? On some morning or afternoon or evening, sometime in 2006, Ebert took his last bite and sip, and he spoke his last word.[/quote]
Another part captured how I feel about others eating:
[quote]
When his friend suddenly apologizes for eating in front of him, for talking about the buttered scallops and how the cream and the fish and the wine combine to make a kind of delicate smoke, Ebert shakes his head. He begins to write and tears a note from the spiral.
No, no, it reads. You're eating for me.[/quote]
Charm
Nice excerpts Charm, it's a great article..... Now if you had been paying attention, or subscribed to the OCF FREE news feed, you would have read this days ago when we posted it....
http://oralcancernews.org/wp/roger-ebert-the-essential-man/Of course since then you would have also read about the work OCF is doing in Appalachia Free clinics,
http://oralcancernews.org/wp/oral-c...g-devices-to-west-virginia-free-clinics/ and much more.
http://oralcancernews.org/wp/category/oral_cancer_news/ What am I going to do with you!!
Brian
Guilty on one count, innocent on the other. I have put OCF news into my Google Reader but was not paying attention. Let this be an object lesson to all the posters to check OCF news first.
Mea Culpa, Mea Culpa, Mea Maxima Culpa
But contrition is not enough, there must be redemptive action, so I have now placed the OCF Reader prominently on my Google Home page in a preview pane, so it will be the first thing I see when I connect to the Internet.
Thanks for the article. WOw my gosh he has realy been through hell. He is an amzing person. He still lives his life to the fullest. K
Amazing article about an amazing man. Makes me so very sad though to remember those that didn't make it through the battle.
Just saw that Roger Ebert will be on the Oprah Winfrey show tomorrow, March 2, 2010...I'll be watching...
Yes, the OCF news feeds mentions that and adds that Mr. Ebert is "ridiculously happy" over his new computer voice crafted from his spoken words on DVD. So Oprah will be its public debut
thanks for updating this thread pookie
Charm
Thanks for posting that article and I for one will do something I never do, watch Ophra. This man is truly a tough bird to have gone thru what he has. He has me rethinking what they want to do to me and I said lets wait. Thanks again Brian and Charm
You guys beat me to it! Yes, Roger Ebert will be on Oprah tomorrow afternoon (March 2nd). Here's the latest article on the OCF news site that talks about Roger's new computerized voice. How cool is this?
http://oralcancernews.org/wp/roger-...rized-voice-produced-from-his-own-words/
DEFINATELY going to be recording oprah!
I don't want to step on SueMarie's post about the horrific gaffe ( his wife lauded for "refusing to let him die). Her feelings and Liz's are very justified.
My wife and I were surprised that Roger's wife, Chaz, dines alone at this huge dinner table while Roger sits in a chair upstairs all by himself with his gravity bag and IV pole. She said she feels it would bother him, but that's not what the quote he gave in Esquire that I excerpted would lead you to believe.
We both noted that when Oprah gushed that Roger was "cancer-free", he DID NOT give the famous "Two Thumbs Up" but instead crossed the fingers on both his hands instead. That seemed very realistic.
Charm
It wasn't everything that we could have wished for. But there were some positives.
1. Most people have never even heard of "our" kind of cancer, Ebert being on Oprah raises awareness manyfold.
2. I am proud that Ebert who has hidden from public view, is way out there in it now. The Esquire pictures and story, the Oprah show, help our cause.
3. In case no one noticed that Apple laptop, is not customized, and every Apple computer has the ability in may different types of voices to speak what is typed. This technology enables, for very low cost, those without a voice to have one. I get this question at the foundation monthly. Commercial text to speech machines costs tens of thousands.
4. You have to remember that this episode of her show was slated for OSCAR talk and predictions, not health issues. Given the nature of the designed programing, I think it was great that she made time in a show dedicated in its entirety to another subject, to have a segment on Ebert's battle.
5. I too didn't really care for the would not let him die comments. But in some way it was a tribute to all that caregivers deal with, and how they fight for us. They are unsung heros in their own right. I know that in my own case about 2/3rd's the way through treatment when the morphine, pain, and depression was the worst, I was clinically suicidal. I really did not wish to go on. Ingrid fought for me, and fought with me to "pony up" fight to continue on. There was no OCF message board to turn to for that kind of keep fighting dialog... it was all her. Had I my own way, I would have put an end to it. Clearly in retrospect that is evidence of several things. One would be that I do not have the inner strengths that many here exhibit. Another is that Ingrid fought with my doctors, for pain relief for me, for psychiatric help, and more when I just didn't give a crap about it and wanted quit and have my life to wind down. So in some respects this could be construed into the words, "she wouldn't let me die" that we heard on TV today. I know that I would have died if it were not for Ingrid's contribution to my fight. I would have taken my own life.
Those of you that have read my thousands of posts here likely find this odd given the tone of my many posts. Depression and pain combined with opiates is an odd mixture of bedfellows. How does a guy that fought for his own life and others in a foreign war, who was no John Wayne by any long shot, who while afraid daily, and daily saw the true ugliness of war, fought on hoping just to get through the next day, encounter a disease state in which he wants to just give up? Over there, I was less alone. I was part of a small group of guys all in the same boat, pulling together and watching each other's ass. As the "doc" they counted on me every day. When I magic markered on my helmet " Bust'in mine to save yours...." It was a statement of bonding in an intimate way with those other brothers in arms. Cancer can be a lonely enemy and fight. Pain can wear the strongest person down, everyone has a threshold. In my cancer experience, for the first time in my life, I knew where that line in the sand was. And I was ready to let it happen, until someone else stepped in and loaned me their strength. Someone else wouldn't let me die. My wife.
So I am a little more forgiving of the way things were stated on TV today, IF they were meant in the same context as my own experience was.
Gwyenth's mom, Blythe Danner has allowed me to draft a letter to be sent from her to Roger. It will praise him for going public and asking him to do a TV PSA for our disease. In the past he has not replied to my contacts to reach out to him, but I am hoping that a letter from Blythe, now timed with his desire to go public, will be received positively and further our cause of public awareness and early detection by getting him to work with us to help others.
Brian
you know that i had the same problems with Robin as you describe,except that he would have killed himself from the minute he was diagnosed given half a chance,so from that point of view yes i suppose i did refuse to allow him to die.I have to agree though that publicity of any description can only help our cause and thats what is important.I just get really mad at these emotive statements that celebraties seem to find essential when talking about things like cancer.I know that i am going to sound really ignorant here but could someone tell me who this man is?
Liz
Ebert is a famous American film critic. I started this thread with a link to the Esquire article without noticing that it had been an OCF news feed story. You can click on those links to read all about Ebert. I don't think BBC ever carried his commentaries. He acquired a pop culture sensibility with his now dead (from brain cancer) partner and their trademarked:
"Two thumbs up" reviews (when they both liked a movie)
The Esquire spread and Oprah appearance are all part of his attempted comeback to prior prominence as his star has definitely faded. As Brian implied, prior to this, Ebert has not been much of Cancer awareness advocate (he has repeatedly ignored OCF overtures) or if he was, it was done so quietly I never heard a peep. Not to be too cynical, but he appears to be playing the Cancer card now. (not that there's anything wrong with that)
Charm