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The Day I Found Out My Life Was Hanging by a Thread (2017)
- MiroF 6y agoI almost wish stuff like this had something like a content warning. Reading this made me quite sad.
- ohdearohdear 6y agoYou poor thing. Drink your warm milk and go back to sleep.
- knolax 6y agoMan that ending was very brunt. I did not expect to just see "he died a few months later" as a footnote at the end.
- brianyu8 6y agoThis story is in the same vein as that of the CloudFlare cofounder[1] who suffers from a rare neurodegenerative disease and has had his life pretty much taken from him at far too young an age. This quote in particular gnaws at me: "We had promised each other that in a few years, when the girls headed off to college, we’d work less and travel more. Amy didn’t deserve to lose those dreams, or her companion, just as we were on the brink." I, presumably like many others here, have spent a lot of time on my career, perhaps to the detriment of other aspects of my life. Is it worth it? That seems like an impossible question to answer. [1]: https://www.wired.com/story/lee-holloway-devastating-decline-brilliant-young-coder/ https://www.wired.com/story/lee-holloway-devastating-decline...
- scottLobster 6y agoMy attitude to stories like this is simply that you can't live under the assumption that you'll die early from some freak cause. It would be a non-functional state of life, sacrificing all long term objectives. At the end of the day all any of us can do is play the odds, and sometimes while playing X-Com that 99% chance-to-hit point blank shot by your most experienced soldier with the best equipment simply misses.
- grecy 6y ago> It would be a non-functional state of life, sacrificing all long term objectives. If your long-term objectives mean sacrificing (or delaying) happiness in the now, then I think you're doing the wrong thing. It's all well and good to have long-term objectives, and we all hope we beat our life expectancy numbers, but you have to make every effort to be happy now, and not wait for some distant and uncertain future that may or may not become reality.
- asveikau 6y agoA key detail here is you can't predict the future. We can all imagine situations where the long term bet pays better. We can even make that sort of prediction in a way that works a good amount of the time, even most of the time. Except sometimes it won't work out. We don't know in advance when that sometimes will be. Be prepared for either outcome I guess.
- grecy 6y ago> Be prepared for either outcome I guess. Yes, exactly. Happiness now (because now is guaranteed) and (hopefully) happiness later too. But whatever you do, don't put off happiness now.
- scottLobster 6y agoSacrificing present happiness for the future is the definition of a long term goal. Today I sacrificed alcohol I would have enjoyed so as to continue losing weight. If I thought I wouldn't be alive months from now to experience the benefits from said weight loss, why do it? Ironically that attitude would actually increase the odds of early-onset nastiness. Why put money into my 401k that I can't touch without penalty for 40 years when I could enjoy it now? Being content and at peace with oneself in the moment is possible, and should be striven for. But for my part I'd have a hard time being content with myself if I wasn't striving for better for both myself and my family. In my experience the only lasting satisfaction in life comes from discharging meaningful responsibilities, that requires some sacrifice of momentary happiness. Happiness is great when it's around but has no staying power, and too many people get sucked into miserable hedonism while trying to turn it into a constant.
- remote_phone 6y agoI remember this article when it first came out. It was like a gut punch. Things like this are so scary and you can do everything right and still die early. When I read he died a few months later it was just horrible to me. I still think about this story often and it scared me to my core that I could have undiagnosed cancer and be dead in months.
- searchableguy 6y agoSame. Why I am against the idea of ever having a family unless I have a fuck you pile of cash. At least that way, you won't have many regrets and you should be able to hire someone to take care of things that you won't live to. It won't be 100% same as when you were there but at least, it won't be the worst. Death isn't as scary as the idea of leaving someone dependent on you behind. They might become dysfunctional without you.
- kaonwarb 6y agoLife insurance can be very reasonably priced.
- searchableguy 6y agoYeah, you are right. Though, you stil require high income to go for higher plans (at least here). My aim would be for my family to live a luxurious life without having to work again. That requires more than life insurance money.
- VRay 6y agoAt any of the big corporate jobs I've held, it's been pretty easy to get life insurance for 8x my yearly salary I think my wife could take 8 years of Silicon Valley salary and retire off it in a lower cost of living area, although you're right that it wouldn't be a luxurious monetary worry-free existence..
- tmikaeld 6y agoOne of my previous bosses and then my client for +10 years, have cancer and is very close to the end. He also spent his life in work and also have regrets. He was fit and healthy, at his peak in life and then have it all taken away. Cancer sucks do damn much..
- _bxg1 6y agoI'm going to go out on a limb and request that people not post this sort of thing here. HNers, I believe, have a higher-than-average rate of anxiety and psychosomaticism (myself included). Articles like this that don't include any real hopeful message or interesting takeaway just cause pointless distress for many of us.
- asveikau 6y agoOn the other hand, many people on HN just like most likely pretty much every human you meet needs to hear something like this in the end blurb: > If I get a soapbox, here’s my short shtick: We are all so fragile. Each day is precious. And the most important parts of our lives are the relationships we invest in. Carpe diem! Do something nice for your loved ones. Make friends with someone you dislike. Go be good to somebody who doesn't deserve it. Our time here is limited, there's little space to be petty.
- _bxg1 6y agoI doubt there's anyone in our society who hasn't heard that adage at one point or another. Not that it isn't meaningful, but I don't think hearing it repeated again justifies the toll on mental health that comes with it in this instance.
- grecy 6y agoI assure you, I've heard it (and said) it tens of thousands of times in my life. Looking back, I didn't even know what it meant until I lost my Mum a year ago at age 67 to cancer. Life is damn short, and the most important thing you can do is have happiness right now.
- asveikau 6y agoI suspect what you may be describing is that it doesn't resonate with everybody all the time. But I think it's pretty common for some life experience to hit hard and someone realizes that all the corny, hackneyed cliches, as silly and overly simple as they seemed, basically had something to it. Then it clicks. But I am sorry to hear about the toll on mental health.
- kleiba 6y agoSo it was weird when my primary care doctor put me on a cocktail of pain killers, nerve blockers, and cortisone shots. I even tried acupuncture. But as my back began to improve in late June, I started to feel off. Sick to my stomach. Weak. Couldn’t sleep. I lost more than 10 pounds. [...] My doctor said I was fit and healthy and that there was no need to run any blood tests. He wondered aloud if this was all in my head. It never stops shocking me how different the American health care system is...
- jotm 6y agoIt's really not exclusive to America.
- grecy 6y agoThe figures say otherwise [1] "Americans are prescribed six times more opioids per capita than citizens in France, despite nationalized medicine in France allowing for easier access to healthcare and more healthcare visits per capita" [1] https://www.dentalcare.com/en-us/professional-education/ce-courses/ce560/comparative-opioid-abuse-rates-in-the-united-states-and-abroad https://www.dentalcare.com/en-us/professional-education/ce-c...
- jotm 6y agoAh well I thought the main point of that excerpt was that they didn't run blood tests and find the cancer sooner. Not the overprescription of medication.
- LilBytes 6y agoWell, based on my experience in the UK and Australia. We get blood tests on pretty much any occasion when we're unwell before we're subscribed to an array of opiates. Shit, I had my wisdom teeth taken out days ago and the dentist was apprehensive to give me anything stronger than ibuprofen and paracetamol. Unfortunately, I think you're mistaken.
- 6y ago
- mirimir 6y agoPancreatic cancer is almost always asymptomatic, until far too late for anything but palliative treatment. And it's extremely coagulogenic, so clots are often the initial symptom.
- bitcoinmoney 6y agoWhy not test everyone then?
- mirimir 6y agoI've wondered that myself. And for myself. I gather that it does take several years to go from early cancer cells to a tumor that's visible by MRI. But once there's a visible tumor, progression is much faster. And by the time you're clotting up and experiencing GI symptoms, you already have multiple metastases. But there's no specific blood test, as far as I know. So basically you'd need an annual MRI scan, I suspect. I guess that'd cost too much. Or maybe damage from the x-ray exposures would overall increase risk.
- MiroF 6y agoNo X-ray radiation from MRI - I’d bet it’s the cost thing.
- Gibbon1 6y agoTwo reasons. False positives and the medical interventions that result aren't without risk. Some cancers are just a death sentence. They start out virulent and spread quickly. And are immune to treatment. Detecting them early buys you nothing. Flip side is some cancers progress slowly. Screening tends to catch the slow indolent cancers and miss the nasty ones. But because they progress slowly catching them early may provide not much benefit.
- ravenstine 6y ago> My doctor said I was fit and healthy and that there was no need to run any blood tests. He wondered aloud if this was all in my head. I'm seeing a different doctor.
- donclark 6y agoIs everyone going to think this - or should the next step in this situation be that every Doctor should recommend that you get a second or third opinion? Without processes in place, we will continue to make the same errors.
- jotm 6y agoDo we just never hear the other side (because there's too many of them and they're too poor to get published)? There's a lot of people who say their parents wished they "left a mark" or did something in this world besides enjoying living. My uncle died of cancer, it took all of 8 months (he likely had it for a while by the time they found it). It was horrible for him. By now, I have about 5 people I knew who just died suddenly or very fast, including one who killed themselves. Life is short and unfair, there's no time for negative emotions like hate, feeling sorry for yourself, regretting stuff imo. Just enjoy whatever life you have.
- bubba1236 6y agosad. isn't it weird this guy was more concerned about his company than talking to his mom? also westerners get a lot of cancer, I think it's all the shit they eat. he exercised so much it didn't help him
- bArray 6y agoI didn't see the "(2017)" when reading this and wasn't aware of the news at the time, so at the end I wondered about how things concluded. Unfortunately Matt passed in 2017 [1] [2] and the company reportedly acquired by Uber in 2019 [3] [4]. My take-away from this is to not waste the precious time we may or may not have, to not have regrets, to have my friends and family know how much they mean to me. A side note: It's a shame that the record of his death by his company only exists through a web archive link. It feels like the passing of a person should be more permanently recorded. It's a single marker that says "this person existed and they mattered". Of course this means a lot to those who knew him directly, but it also means a lot to those in the future trying to understand their family history or the history of our society. For example, the people who were killed during the witch trials - although their deaths were tragic, at least there is some recording of the injustice done against them [5]. [1] https://www.geekwire.com/2017/mighty-ai-co-founder-matt-bencke-dies-45-battle-pancreatic-cancer/ https://www.geekwire.com/2017/mighty-ai-co-founder-matt-benc... [2] https://web.archive.org/web/20171020053826/https://mty.ai/blog/in-our-hearts-always/ https://web.archive.org/web/20171020053826/https://mty.ai/bl... [3] https://mty.ai/ https://mty.ai/ [4] https://www.geekwire.com/2019/uber-acquires-seattle-startup-mighty-ai-fuel-push-self-driving-cars/ https://www.geekwire.com/2019/uber-acquires-seattle-startup-... [5] http://www.witchtrials.co.uk/ http://www.witchtrials.co.uk/
- DoreenMichele 6y agoMy doctor ... wondered aloud if this was all in my head. Just as a PSA: This is all too common with obscure conditions. Before I finally got a proper diagsnosis, I spent months on antibiotics with doctors unsure what to do and when I expressed my concern with them having no answers and being unable to fix me that this could kill me, I was asked if I wanted to speak with a psychiatrist. I wish medical doctors would be trained to never, ever dismiss anything as "all in your head."
- MiroF 6y agoOn the other hand, there are people for whom it is in their head, but cost considerable (and scarce) medical resources having it investigated and treated. It's a balancing act.
- DoreenMichele 6y agoThere is a difference between concluding that someone may need to see a mental health professional to check out that angle and acting like someone is a nutter for being concerned that the failure of doctors to pinpoint the problem might actually prove deadly. One is about getting actual answers. The other is about blowing off the patient, being dismissive and belittling legitimate concerns and it routinely proves deadly. In my experience and from everything I have read, the latter is far too common. It is much more common than the former.
- MiroF 6y agoDoctors being wrong is more common than hypochondriacs and overuse of the medical system? I guess we'll just agree to disagree.
- DoreenMichele 6y agoDoctors being dismissive, especially towards women and people of color, is excessively common. It's easily googled and it contributes to high mortality in some populations. Here is just one such article: https://www.oprahmag.com/life/health/a23100351/racial-bias-in-healthcare-black-women/ https://www.oprahmag.com/life/health/a23100351/racial-bias-i... I'm a woman and was called a hypochondriac until I got the right diagnosis at age 35. I'm skeptical that hypochondria is as common as people seem to think. I think people with real problems that aren't easily identified and being dismissed is probably far more common that actual psychosomatic illness. Probably somatopsychic illness is the real explanation in many of those cases.
- BtdTom 6y agoThe length of one's life is uncertain. Death is certain. The Buddha recommended that both lay and monastic followers perform the following recollections on a daily basis: 1. I am sure to become old; I cannot avoid ageing. 2. I am sure to become ill; I cannot avoid illness. 3. I am sure to die; I cannot avoid death. 4. I must be separated and parted from all that is dear and beloved to me. 5. I am the owner of my actions, heir of my actions. Whatever actions I do, good or bad, of these I shall become the heir. The first four recollections require no faith and can be perceived in the here and now. I find that regularly contemplating the above recollections are helpful in reminding me of my own mortality. They also prompt me to question my direction in life and what I'm working on. It's often easier to make frequent but smaller course corrections than really big changes. With all that said, I still find myself falling into the illusion that I can control what happens in my life and that I'm building something permanent. We can certainly influence aspects of our lives, but at the end of the day it's all impermanent, beyond our absolute control, and will pass away.
- Havoc 6y agoMuch like others I found the no blood test thing wild. Personally I've just resorted to doing annual blood test in a 3rd world country. There the doctors will run whatever you like basically - it's paid at commercial (3rd world) rates so they don't give AF. Ironically in a "european" healthcare system the doctors are much more reluctant given that they need to fairly allocate public funds.
- canucker2016 6y agoThe gut punch that keeps on punching... A bit of web searching yields: YouTube video from Matt's family and friends about Matt Bencke: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbgVvCnvrAk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbgVvCnvrAk Matt's wife and friends post to https://www.facebook.com/groups/benckeupdates/ https://www.facebook.com/groups/benckeupdates/ (most content viewable w/o login) Here's a covid19-related post - https://www.facebook.com/groups/benckeupdates/permalink/650190082226412/ https://www.facebook.com/groups/benckeupdates/permalink/6501... One sad thing is that the domain registration for Matt's personal website has expired. So the web has recycled the website a couple of times. Now the website content is NSFW. :(
- simonblack 6y agoI laughingly went into the cardiac clinic to have a routine angiogram that wouldn't find anything. I even made a play on my surname that I was going to have a "strangiogram". A bit later, the doctors said "We're not sure if we'll let you go home or not." I had plaques closing off my main cardiac artery just where it branches. If I got a full blockage there it would be curtains immediately, with no chance whatever. Stents were no good, if they put a stent in one arm of the fork it would close off the other and vice-versa. I was literally a walking time-bomb. They eventually said I could go home. Two weeks later I had a triple bypass.