Top 10 Cancer-Surviving Tips to Avoid

Don't use the cancer card to have your school workload reduced, to cheat on tests, or get paid to do nothing. Use it instead to get the big piece of chicken at dinner.
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The distress from having cancer may lead to irrational decisions. Keep these 10 "don'ts" handy during your most vulnerable times:

1) Don't order the heart attack-in-waiting at your favorite greasy restaurants. You crave this when you are unable to eat, and want to remove all dietary restrictions when your appetite returns. Remember that although you already have cancer, you can get it twice. The vomiting resulting from your chemo will only prevent you from getting fat temporarily.

2) Don't make your friends order you a hooker, as your chemo could be less potent when combined with the Valtrex for your newly acquired herpes.

3) Don't acquire unnecessary material objects. Relatives offer to buy gifts to ease your pain. Their gesture is meant as a courtesy, but you start your wish list now, in order of preference. You mark the responsible party's name next to each item and cross it off when you receive it. But in the end the list always includes the following that will make you feel empty inside: rare candies not found in stores, celebrities' undergarments found only on eBay, and Taylor Swift's latest album.

4) Don't use the cancer card to have your school workload reduced, to cheat on tests, or get paid to do nothing. Use it instead to get the big piece of chicken at dinner.

5) Don't use Facebook. You would regret updating your status with your feelings, political rants and pleads for prayers. Never mind, you did that even before cancer.

6) Don't abuse drugs. Your friends may offer to buy them from you, and grandma may even trade you for a spot in her will but: Just Say No.

7) Don't be one with nature. The sun will damage your vulnerable skin and dry your eyes. You are safer indoors with the air conditioning and near your toilet, puke bucket and HEPA filters.

8) Don't masturbate just because you heard a faulty study claiming that three ejaculations per week reduce cancers of the reproductive organs by 40 percent. If your oncology nurse catches you then it will be awkward and embarrassing and you will never want to see her again, though you will still have to, four days a week in 12-hour shifts.

9) Don't assume girls dig scars and hairless people based on Vin Diesel. You are better off not trying to explain The Fast and the Furious.

10) Don't force your mom to hear offensive music while she drives you to and from appointments. Just because she loves you and would tolerate Lil Wayne's "Blunt Blowin'" does not mean you should take advantage of her by also playing his song, "Poke Her Face."

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