• Investment World
• eWorld
• Catalyst
• Mentor
• Life
• Canvas
• Praxis
• Urban Pulse
• Brand Quest

Preeti Mehra

Cancer couldn't keep him down. The communications professional in Anup Kumar propelled him to pen a book to help others face the dreaded disease.

A lump forms in the throat as he reads out excerpts from his book, The Joy of Cancer, at a glittering book release function at the Grand Hyatt, New Delhi, last week. You can't help but admire his ability to stand in a crowd and read to the audience passages from a time that most people would want to put behind them, leave alone share with others.

But Anup Kumar, who has spent most of his working career in the advertising industry and now heads the corporate communications department of a leading industrial house, is made of sterner stuff. Having battled cancer for two long years (even when he was told that he had only four months to live), Kumar has wanted to instil in other cancer patients a positive outlook. For that is what won him more than half his battle. "It was my wife, my family and friends and our determination to pull through the ordeal,'' he says.

The blurb on his book reads, "Anyone whose life has been touched with cancer will find courage, wisdom and inspiration in this book.'' And that's exactly what the book does. It takes you step by step along the agonising road that Kumar travelled as so do many other cancer patients. From discovering the disease, to accepting it and participating in the treatment is a long, long journey that brings with it pain, anguish, determination and a will to win.

But how could Kumar equate a battle with the most dreaded disease with the feeling of joy? The clue lies in the opening words of his book, where he quotes Prophet Khalil Gibran on Joy and Sorrow. "Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. And how else can it be.''

How else could it have been for Kumar, when he is honest enough to admit, "It was ironic that in the face of death, I began, for the first time, to really live.'' And despite the fact that he had to move from chemotherapy to chemotherapy and find clumps of hair falling on his pillow, he was able to see the benefits that he derived from cancer. "I stopped smoking after so many years, and believe me with no withdrawal symptoms,'' he says. And apart from the clearer air in the house, cancer forced him to slow down his pace, contemplate on life, value friends and family, build faith in himself and even write a book. "None of these may have never happened otherwise.''

One thing that Kumar keeps repeating and would want all other patients to know, that in this battle you have to go it alone. He says, "It's your body. It's your mind. It's your cancer. It's your battle. Only you have the answers to how you can live.''

Kumar's battle with his cancer cells was a very personal way that he dealt with the problem. Along with participating hundred per cent in his treatment, he `reasoned' with the dreaded cells within him and `made peace with them'. "But the crucial first step," he says, "is to accept the cancer. Then you must choose your doctor and treatment, think positive, set specific goals and visualise your way to health."

While Kumar's introduction is powerful and poignant, the book itself contains a hundred different tips for those who have had to confront cancer. He explodes myths linked to the disease, offers a lot of information on the kinds of cancer, the therapies available and the side effects of different forms of treatment. What are the right foods to eat and what are the precautions a patient should take. He also lists out cancer support societies, clinics, hospitals all over the country and Websites and books that can be consulted.

But what Kumar does most of all is reaffirm your faith in yourself and humankind. He uses his own highs and lows, anguish and joy to fill the reader's cup with the determination to win. And above all, his use of humour — those wonderful, yet ironic cartoons in his book — makes you smile, despite the tears.

Picture by Ramesh Sharma

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Stories in this Section
For that authentic taste

Copyright © 2002, The Hindu Business Line. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu Business Line