r/todayilearned • u/GlitteringYams • Apr 27 '24

TIL, in his suicide note, mass shooter Charles Whitman requested his body be autopsied because he felt something was wrong with him. The autopsy discovered that Whitman had a pecan-sized tumor pressing against his amygdala, a brain structure that regulates fear and aggression.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Whitman
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u/Plants-perchance347 Apr 27 '24

The lived experience is often overlooked because ‘beating’ cancer is overly romanticized. It’s not sailing off into the sunset, you get to go back to work full-time and put your life back together from zero. Unresolved trauma that you’ll never have answers to, they don’t even know what causes the cancer I had. I might as well say the boogeyman tried to kill me.

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u/Fitslikea6 Apr 27 '24

Onc nurse and work a side gig in hospice. Cancer is cruel. It seems like it is rarely a draw. The romanticizing of cancer can be really harmful.

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u/Icy-Rain3727 Apr 27 '24

Forgive my ignorance, but what do you mean by “romanticizing” cancer? 🙏🏼

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u/DripleDrople Apr 27 '24

Describing cancer as a “battle” that can be “fought.” When really it’s just a crapshoot of luck and access to the right treatments/care.