Have a treatment strategy. Steel yourself to have the will to execute your strategy. By strategy I don’t mean know exactly what you are going to do or which treatments you will accept or reject. I mean commit yourself to life and, even when you are physically weaker than you ever thought possible and you are mentally exhausted, advocate (fight) for yourself and for your desires and your input to be included in how you effort to stay alive.

Interview your physicians. Anything really going on between their ears? Lots of people in all professions shouldn’t be in the profession they’ve chosen. They suck at it. We’ve all engaged with a salesperson, plumber, homebuilder, retail manger, attorney, etc, etc who should never have chosen to pursue nor have been hired into their profession. Yet, there they are uninformed screwing up what you’ve tasked them to do. Physicians are no different. Don’t assume they know more about you than you do. Hell, don’t assume they know more than you do about the particular genetic or microbiological nature of your cancer…make them prove they know more than you. An incurious human in other professions may cost you time and money, and incurious General Practitioner and/or Oncologist will cost you days, months, maybe even years off your lifespan.

Every descent, honorable and worthwhile physician I have interacted with has five qualities, they are 1) insatiably curious, 2) highly intelligent, 3) tenacious and have true grit, 4) competitive - they want to win and winning to them is you living the best life you can live, and 5) respectful of you as a human and of your knowledge of your own spirit, mind and body…they will work with you and your treatment strategy.

Choose your physicians wisely, like your life depends on it - because it does.