A Mesothelioma Comrade With Whom I Fought Cancer for Nearly Eight Years Has Worsened

I had originally decided to take Friday off, but an unavoidable matter cropped up and I had to cancel the plan. After finishing my business and seeing my patients on Friday, I decided that no matter what I would leave the little building where I hole up every day and go out for some air.

But just before leaving, I took a video look at a mesothelioma patient I had treated for seven or eight years, and my plans changed again. Feeling he was now safe and sound, he had been careless and stopped the medicine I prescribed him for over half a year, and his condition had relapsed.

Then, in panic, this patient who had stuck with my pure TCM treatment for so long took to chemotherapy and targeted drugs, and even tried a folk TCM doctor's home remedy. Unfortunately, none of it worked, and he ran into the worst side effect of targeted drugs—a cerebral infarction. Now, apart from being able to speak, his hands and feet can no longer move.

This video call left me very sad. These long-term patients are like artworks I have carefully created; into every one of them I have poured a great deal of effort. The theme of my life over these years has been keeping them alive. Seeing my own creation destroyed, I am genuinely grieved.

How many seven- or eight-year stretches does a life have? We call it a doctor-patient relationship, but in fact we have long since become the closest of friends. I do not have many friends in life, but my long-term patients are all my closest friends.

They are all genuinely good to me. Take this mesothelioma patient: every time he came to see me, he carried a big bag of kelp to give me. I told him repeatedly that I had not finished the last batch and that he needn't bring any more, but he simply would not listen. He had to express his gratitude somehow.

And his state over these years has indeed been excellent: robust and strong, with better stamina than a normal person, undiminished at work and on business trips. The kelp he carried from so far away each time was heavy enough that I struggled to lift it.

Every time he came for a follow-up, he would, after the consultation, inevitably chat with me for a while. Even which school his child should attend, he would ask my opinion. Having fought the war for eight years, neither of us can really do without the other. Fearing he could not keep up financially, I always found ways to lower the cost of his medication.

I only want him to live. I only want these patients who trust me so wholeheartedly to live. Only if they live can my own life value be realized; otherwise, what is the point of my studying medicine?

Our shared wish had been to set, together, a record for the longest survival of a mesothelioma patient—most mesothelioma patients basically die within two years. In the mesothelioma groups he had been in, almost whole groups of fellow patients had passed on before him. Counting the year-plus he survived before coming to me, he was not far from a ten-year survival.

I remember when he passed the five-year mark, we were both so happy. We made a pact: after he lived another five years, I would organize the whole course of treating him into a paper and publish it.

Who, besides the patient and family, is not filled with hope for a survival of ten-plus years? Which carefully treated patient is not, like my own masterpiece, something I cannot bear to part with?

Nowadays, though my followers are not as numberless as fish crossing a river, they are indeed many. But eight years ago, though I was not obscure, my influence was far less than now, and I was still very young. The patients who dared, back then, to entrust their lives to me trusted me unconditionally, and their feelings were utterly sincere.

Each time one such old friend loses his wings, it plunges me into deepest grief. When we joke together, I often say to these old patients: "You are my signboard. You must live well for me. If you don't live well, you are smashing my signboard—don't go and smash my signboard."

But heaven does not always fulfill human wishes. After the Lunar New Year this year, two such old patients relapsed, leaving not only other doctors at a loss but me as well.

These years I have, while treating disease, been building ties with reliable Chinese and Western colleagues who fight cancer, hoping that one day, when an old patient's condition slips out of my control, some colleague can help me save them, keep them alive, and let these patients keep us cancer-fighting doctors company.

I am willing to be such a backup for other colleagues too, although most of the time we are simply cleaning up each other's mess; but sometimes we can rescue one or two.

So whenever a patient is referred by a close colleague, I brace myself and take them on. Among the doctors who refer such patients to me are several Western doctoral supervisors, some already white-haired. Doctors with such breadth of heart, I believe, share my wishes and my feelings.

How arduous the road of fighting cancer is, only the patients can truly resonate with us cancer-fighting doctors. That mingled feeling when life hangs by a thread—only they share it with us; they are our true kindred spirits. Keeping them alive is our greatest wish.

The physician who treats cancer has an inner strength greater than the average doctor. I deeply know that I have no escape in this life; the rest of my days must be devoted to these patients. After much struggle, I have now accepted and even grown to love this imperfect work.

I have long since told my family: on the day my life ends, do not grieve that I worked so hard all my life; be happy for me, and think that I took joy in it. Had I not had this toil, I would be a walking corpse. My whole life's value lies in this toil. My patients, my writings, and even the other patients saved in future through my writings, are all the continuation of my life. Only this cause I love can fill my life with meaning.

I do not fear failure, and I keep moving forward. The road is long and full of twists. May all my colleagues remain true to our original purpose and forge ahead.