Cancer Survival for Software Developers 263
Paul Pareti writes "Doug Reilly has published an affecting, personal piece about Surviving Cancer if you're a Programmer. You don't have to be a sufferer to benefit from reading it, especially his conclusions, including the perspective-lengthening advice: 'Make sure you are not indispensable!'"
If you are indespensible.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Sure it sounds WRONG, but take a step back, and think about it. I'm going to die in 6 months, sorry ozzy/harriet daddy has to go take care of some stuff at the office, dont worry, i got 6 months left.
Unless ofcourse its Curable, which then, I would have to balance the two a little more carefuly.
Yeah right (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm dying...UH OH, I'd better make sure all my code is documented. That's ridiculous.
This should be standard practice (Score:5, Insightful)
* Make certain that source code is where it should be.
* Clearly document anything "strange" in the source code you deliver. .
* Make certain you have a "buddy" developer who knows what you are doing.
If nothing else, the first two are essential if you want to read your _own_ source code after a year or two's time and figure out what is going on.
Incurable cancer business plan (Score:5, Insightful)
2. Sell house, possessions.
3. Move to tropical island paradise.
4. When the pain sets in - gun to head.
5. Afterlife????
Facing death... (Score:5, Insightful)
Most everyone nowadays is dispensable (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, if you are dying, you may have other priorities in your last days. The above quote might be relevant if you own or run a company, but not for the average Joe.
Most people would not think twice about quitting their boring jobs and actually try to enjoy the last hours of their lives.
This is not for people who are actively dying.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course you would. If you were currently dying of cancer. He says very clearly that if your case is terminal, that's what you should do. The article isn't for those people
It's for people with either curable cancer, or cancer that is long-term treatable (will likely kill you in the next decade, but you'll be fine for at least a few more years). People in those situations can't afford to quit work entirely (not with those Dr bills, trust me!), and in all likelyhood shouldn't give up their normal lives. But it does mean that they have a better-than-average chance of dying, and should probably take a few precautions just in case.
Yes, if you hate your job, hopefully something like that would be a wake-up call to change your situation. But if you're fine with your job, and are most likely not dying anytime soon, quitting is not necessarily the obvious solution.
Re:If you are indespensible.. (Score:5, Insightful)
There, fixed it for you.
Awkward Article (Score:5, Insightful)
Here is how it works... You get diagnosed with cancer and then you freakin' forget ANYTHING about work. Period. I don't frickin' care if you are the president or Sheryl Crow. You take care of yourself and your family. Managing your work is just below the bottom of any priority or list you may have.
Been there, done that with too many family members and others in our support network. The article is pure sci-fi/fantasy/victim-hood non-sense. I don't think that in my life that I have ever been offended by anything, but the editor who put this on Slashdot is getting pretty close to being the first to do so.
Re:Facing death... (Score:5, Insightful)
Why does it take impending death ? (Score:5, Insightful)
Every day you go to work before your child gets up and get home after they've gone to sleep is a day that you both lose. Every saturday you spend getting those TPS reports done is another day of play and growth that you will miss with your child.
An earlier poster said that they would spend the time making sure that their kids know what they need to. That kinda implies they aren't doing it now. People say that they would spend the time with their family.
Maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick - maybe you already do that. But to me, every day I live is one day closer to the end of my life. I only work to make sure that I can keep my family safe, warm, healthy and educated. Once I've worked enough to make that happen, the rest of the time is for them, because each day is one less day that I have to share with them.
My first response is "Screw 'em"... (Score:4, Insightful)
Employers will dump you in a nanosecond if the finance number crunch that way, and they will not in the least be concerned with
Why should I be concerned about theirs?
My thoughts on work and death... (Score:4, Insightful)
I work on an internal system at a large company that's mission critical to our core business. Five people in the history of the company have worked on it - two moved on, one died, and there are two of us left. He's a private pilot, I'm a suicidal driver, and we spend quite a bit of time together outside of work. The question comes up regularly, "What if you guys get hit by a bus?"
My answer: Then I'm dead, I no longer give a @#$^.
Cancer comments (Score:5, Insightful)
My mother died of breast cancer 6 years ago. She was diagnosed in her mid/late 50s and insisted that we not tell anyone. She didn't want to be viewed or treated differently. When her cancer recurred, her doctor called it "terminal recurring breast cancer" and gave her 6 months to a year to live. She lived 8 more years after the reappearance and died of cancer at age 80.
When first diagnosed and for most of the time following that the web didn't exist but she did take advantage of other resources like medical libraries. Research is important as the author attests. Equally important, however, is finding the right experts.
My mother saw one doctor who, after a cursory exam and x-ray viewing, declared that the cancer had spread and had eaten away part of her ribs and said, "come back next week and we'll start chemo". No discussion of options (other than joining a statistical study the Dr. was involved in). She saw another doctor who spent some time on the case. She saw the same x-rays and patient but was able to determine that the darkness on the x-ray was not due to "dissolved ribs" but due to dense soft-tissue blocking the x-ray and that the range-of-motion issues were due to the tumor. A couple months of Tamoxifen and the tumor had shrunk to golf-ball size and was removed with relative ease. The range-of-motion issues started easing within a couple weeks of starting Tamoxifen.
Also, don't get complacent. My mother had a mastectomy so she didn't think cancer when she started having discomfort raising her arm on that side. She assumed that if she did get cancer it would be on the remaining breast. Wrong. If you have cancer, be extra careful about continuing checkups even after you are "cured".
My dad got prostate cancer which was discovered due to urinary symptoms. Routine screening wasn't done at that time and through careful research and good medicine he lived 13 more years. He died last year at age 76. With earlier detection he might still be with us.
So for the rest of us, get those exams. I'm in my 40s but get regular PSA and prostate checks due to the family history. I also get a full body check for skin-cancer every couple years (from birth to age 18 I lived in the Mojave desert sun with my hair turning white and my skin turning brown every summer - we didn't know from sunscreen back then). When I turn 50 I'll probably be first in line for the colonoscopy. If I do get cancer, I want to catch it early.
Re:Hmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Yes it would be nice if you could sit around for 6 months. But it is selfish.
Re:Hmm (Score:3, Insightful)
I thought it was kind of dumb too... (Score:1, Insightful)
2. Write legible code and document it ANWAY - you should have to be dying to do so!
3. A terminal disease nonwithstanding - you could get hit by a bus tomorrow.
4. There is a far greater chance that anyone reading this will get layed-off by their employeer and cast them into the same situation.
Re:If you are indespensible.. (Score:2, Insightful)
That doesn't just apply to cancer, either. It applies to diseases like MS, and even simply going out of business.
Re:Hmm (Score:3, Insightful)
No it doesn't. No-one goes to their death bed thinking "I wish I'd spent more time in the office..."; that's especially true when they go 30 or 40 years before their time.
If I have only a couple of months to live, then I'm sorry, I'd spend as much time as possible with family and friends. Project deadline? Devil take your client requirements, I have more important things to do and precious little time to do them in.
Work steals enough of our time as it is; don't let it take your final moments too.
Re:Awkward Article (Score:5, Insightful)
Unless, like the author says, your cancer is treatable and you know most likely won't be dying anytime soon. I continued in grad school (both classes and a research assistantship) full-time while I was getting chemo and radiation. My family wanted me to move back with them (1000 miles away), but I knew that would be completely stupid in my case. I only had about a 20% (or less) chance of dying, but if I'd quit school and done that I would have had a 100% chance of severe depression, which is shown to reduce surivial rates. Not to mention losing my insurance, which would mean that once I was done with treatment I'd probably have to declare bankruptcy, and boy would THAT make the next few years of my life more fun.
Over all, there was no way in hell I was going to let cancer dictate my life. Now, if the initial treatment hadn't worked, and my chances got significantly lower, needed a bone marrow transplant, etc - then I would have pretty much had to quit, and would have gone back to be with my family. But that didn't happen, and my family eventually realized I'd made the right decision.
Dying of cancer and having cancer are two very different situations, and have to be dealt with very differently. It's also the kind of thing that's totally different for different people - I was able to take 3 classes and work 10-20 hours a week during chemo, some people on the same regimen aren't able to. I liked what I was doing a lot; others who don't like their job may see it as more of a nuisance during treatment, or may not have supervisors as understanding and flexible as mine.
I don't know what your current situation is, but I hope that your treatment is going well. And I hope that you're only letting cancer tell you what to do when you absolutely have to.
And if you discover somebdy is indispensible... (Score:3, Insightful)
Very well said (Score:4, Insightful)
Don't get me wrong, I don't really care what my company does or doesn't do after I'm gone, but I have some great friends here and I do care quite a bit about them. I wouldn't want to suddenly drop tons of work on them when I know a 10 minute conversation or copying code would have saved the day.
Perhaps it's a bit selfish, but I would like to leave the impression when I'm gone that "Yeah, he was a great guy" rather than "He was a great guy, but now we're screwed". I try not to leave projects unfinished and I see no reason why my career as a whole needs to be any different.
Re:Cancer Shmancer (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Yeah right (Score:2, Insightful)
Also, I've never really bought the "I'd spend all my time with my kids" argument. For one thing, there isn't that much time you could do that anyway. Are you going to keep them out of school until you die? Do you think your kids really want to be around you 24 hours a day anyway, whether you have terminal cancer or not? Plus, you know, while you're alive you usually have to work. My landlord wouldn't stop asking for his rent just because I was dying.
What About Incurable Life? (Score:4, Insightful)
I know that to some extent you have to work to keep the symptoms of incurable life in check. Having to eat, having to have shelter, that sort of thing. But I think you should at least be doing something you like. To date I've known 3 guys who came down with cancer while working in the IT industry. They all kept working for as long as they were able to, not because they had to but because they wanted to. I think if I got cancer I'd want to keep working as long as possible as well. Admittedly I don't have much in the way of close family, though.
Re:Hmm (Score:5, Insightful)
Well, you do have a terminal disease. It's called aging. It'll get you sooner or later if the proverbial bus doesn't make it's appearance, so it's not a bad idea to keep your actual day to day activities a reasonably close reflection of what your real priorities are.
I do this everyday and AFAIK I do not have cancer (Score:2, Insightful)
I was the youngest of 6. At that time my dad was going to funerals every other week because his coworkers were in the killing years (40-60). I can't count how many times I was told that "you do not want to get here and look back sorry you did not follow your dream" or some such words. To this day I gag at the smell of funeral parlors, but I took that message to heart. I look back and wish it turned out better, but I do not regret doing it.
When your kids are parents... (Score:2, Insightful)
I know, it's a balance that is required, but my wife and I have talked about it and we've decided if either of us gets hit with an illness like that, we'll sell the house, get a houseboat, and spend the remaining days as a family on a worldwide adventure. "irresponsible"? Maybe if you're idea of responsible is to be good little corporate citizen.
But different people have different priorities I guess.
Don't get hit by a bus (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Hospice nurse's perspective.... (Score:5, Insightful)
I think that this is the whole point that so many people are missing. I kept working/going to school during chemo because I loved what I did, and not doing it would depress me enough to interfere with my treatment. If I were some corporate drone with a job I hated, then I probably would have taken it as a sign to get out - but luckily, I've worked hard since high school to make sure I'm never in that position. I know what kind of impact I want to have on the world, I know how I want to get there, and I love everything about it. So cancer had no effect on my career plans whatsoever - although it did cause me to make one decision in my personal life that I would not have made otherwise, that did slightly affect my career. But only slightly.
Some people do need to keep working through treatments, and working a sucky job during treatment would just make a bad situation worse.
If you don't love what you're doing, don't wait for cancer to get out of it. Just like people are saying that you should comment your code whether you're dying or not - you should actively pursue a career that you would MISS if you had to give it up for chemo, whether or not that chemo is imminent.
Re:Hmm (Score:4, Insightful)
Part of preparing for death (assuming you get a chance to) involves talking about it with the important people in your life, and assuring yourself that those you leave behind are going to be OK. While your co-workers probably don't rank up there with your children and beloved partner in that respect, you may very well count them among your friends, and I know that I'd hate to leave my friends in the lurch if I could prevent it.
Re:Awkward Article (Score:3, Insightful)
Go on with life (Score:5, Insightful)
After surgery to remove the primary tumor, I was faced with chemotherapy and a 50% chance of dying within two years. My first reaction was like many of yours: give up work and move home to be close to family and friends. Or, pack up and travel the world with my remaining days.
But then I realized that giving up work and moving home would be depressing. I'd just be a cancer victim sitting around, waiting to die. It's hard to have any more good times in such a grim situation.
And traveling the world wouldn't be much fun either. One of the problems when you're sick with cancer is that you don't feel good. It's not like the doctor says "you have two weeks to live" after which you feel fine for two weeks and then pass away in your sleep. No, when the end is that close it's a struggle just to stay comfortable and enjoy things like food and warmth. So traveling the world would mean feeling crappy in a foreign land surrounded by strangers.
So I decided that I liked where I was in my life and would keep doing what I liked doing. That meant continuing to work, continuing to meet new people, continuing to learn things and watch movies and play games. That meant trying to be a person plus cancer, rather than a person destroyed by cancer. Sure, my perspective changed. I straightened out my personal relationships and felt freer to express my own quirky personality.
Continuing with normal things helped me to survive chemotherapy and more surgeries. And with the help of a great employer and coworkers I continued to be productive -- a little bit on bad days and a lot on good days -- and feel good about myself. The benefit of working with computers was that I could be productive from home and the computer would wait patiently when I was hit with a bout of nausea or fatigue.
These days I'm feeling fine but I know that any day the cancer could rear its ugly head again. My motto is to go on with life as if you have two years to live. Don't panic and drop everything and curl up on the couch. But remember that you don't have forever to do the things you want to do.
AlpineR
Re:Hmm (Score:3, Insightful)
If you don't have enough money in savings to sit around for six months, then you've over-extended yourself (or you're poor, but given that this is Slashdot, I'm assuming not). If we were talking about a couple years then you'd have a point, but you should always have at least a several month reserve of money lying around. It may not be cancer or illness that makes you need to use it, it could be a lay-off.
Re:If you are indespensible.. (Score:4, Insightful)
1) He screws up, gets fired, then is "overqualified" for technical positions he subsequently applies for and ends up taking a $7/hour job.
or
2) He screws up, retains his job and even gets promoted, but is miserable as hell doing it. Eventually his company has to downsize (or goes under) due to poor management and he gets laid off.
Re:If you are indespensible.. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:If you are indespensible.. (Score:3, Insightful)
I personally have no interest in doing the tech team manager job at my last place. It's a position for minimal project management, a lot of customer interfacing and zero tech oversight. All you're doing really is watching schedules and pushing numbers around on gantt chart.
On the other hand, you could quite legitimately call a technical architect the team manager. They're interfacing with the client and passing the work around their team, but they're passing the work around based on a self-determined high-level tech plan (potentially developed in conjunction with team members) and acting as a mentor to junior staff. At which point it starts getting more interesting...
Re:dispensible (Score:2, Insightful)
Even if you're dying... (Score:3, Insightful)
A lot of posts, yours included, seem to have this mythical concept that you can simply drop everything and gather your family to your side for all your remaining days. Well, guess what? You can't. Why? Because they have lives too. Your kids can't drop oiut of school, your wife is going to need to keep up with her job (she'll be the family's only source of income after you die) Hell, maybe your ass needs to put in a little more work to pay off those bills that the insurance doesn't cover. If you think they're all going to be covered, you must not have any familiarity with the system. You let them prepare for their future even as you prepare for your lack thereof. You do these things because you love your family, and in the little time you have left you need to make sure they are in the best position possible. I'm glad that the people in my own family who have died were never as selfish as you.
to tell you the truth, I was planning to give you a somewhat more civil response, but having seen how you've treated porcupine when she shared her, much more realistic, way of dealing with her cancer, I've come to the conclusion that you really don't deserve any respect. You seem put out that she made the mature decision to plan for her 80% chance of life as opposed to her 20% chance of death. Well, since she's alive and posting to /., it seems to me she made the right choice. I'm sorry for whoever must have died and left you with these angry feelings, but you need to get over them.