No Cure for Being Human summary

Let’s leave Kate in that hospital gift shop for a moment. Her story will pick up again in the next blink, where she grapples with her diagnosis. But to understand her story, it’s also important to understand exactly what the concept of “best life” is, and why Kate has pushed against it her whole career.

“I’m living my best life.” All of a sudden, it’s a phrase that’s all but ubiquitous. Wellness gurus, hip hop artists, and Peloton instructors alike exhort us to live our best lives. We’re targeted with ads for products from cleansing juices to productivity apps, each of them claiming to be the one thing we need to attain our best lives. Skimming the self-help section of any bookshop reveals all kinds of methods for achieving the elusive best life, from winning friends and influencing people to condensing our professional lives into a four-hour work week. And of course, once “best life” – or at least the appearance of it – is attained, it has to be scrupulously documented on social media. #blessed, as they say.

Before cancer, Kate’s life was a series of carefully cultivated choices, all designed to add value to her existence. A lot of them were good, even great, choices. She’d chosen to marry her childhood sweetheart, Toban, who also happened to be the love of her life. Together, they’d chosen to start a family, and the result was their wonderful son, Zach.

Of course, each of these choices was once just a wish or a yearning. It was Kate’s hard work and relentlessly positive outlook that allowed her to bring them to fruition. Or so she always thought. Now, with the foundations of her life crumbling beneath her, Kate saw that each carefully crafted choice was also underpinned by sheer luck and random chance.

Kate is sitting across from a mental health counselor called Caitlin, who is gently asking her if there are any experiences she’s always dreamed of having or skills she’s always wanted to acquire. Maybe she wants to take up oil painting or look down on Paris from the top of the Eiffel Tower or finally dance the tango before . . . well, this last part is unspoken, but it hangs in the air between them. Before time runs out.

Then, Kate is offered a tiny glimmer of hope. She’s been invited to take part in an immunotherapy trial. She’s part of a small percentage of patients with colon cancer who might – potentially, just maybe, no promises – respond to a cutting-edge drug-treatment plan. For Kate, this means flying every week from North Carolina to Atlanta, to spend the day receiving a combination of chemotherapy and drug treatment while a team of doctors gathers data, asking her how much pain she’s in on a scale of one to ten.

Math isn’t Kate’s strong suit. She’s a humanities scholar, specializing in the history of Christianity in North America. She can tell you all about the rise of the megachurch or the place of women in contemporary evangelism. But all of a sudden, her life is all about calculations. Impossible calculations in which, no matter how she tries to balance them, she can’t come up with a satisfactory answer. 

She’s responded well to the immunotherapy trial. The tumors that once crowded her colon and liver have shrunk. But they haven’t disappeared. They are still a feature of every scan and every x-ray. In particular, there’s a nasty-looking tumor in Kate’s liver, nestled right next to a vital cord that transmits blood to her lower body.

First, there’s the good news: Kate opts for a liver resection, meaning a large, tumor-riddled chunk of her liver will be removed. The biggest tumor is deemed inoperable, but there’s hope it might respond to radiation.

Next, there’s the great news: at a follow-up meeting with her oncologist, the big, malignant, inoperable tumor has shrunk. It’s shrunk so much it’s barely discernible. At the next follow-up, it has vanished completely. 

Kate’s cancer diagnosis brought her to the brink of death, and at the last minute, she was granted a miraculous reprieve. Does that mean she experiences life with a new clarity, focusing only on things that are truly meaningful and authentic?

Yes . . . and no. 

At the start of her cancer treatment, Kate signs herself up for a clinical trial. She, and others with her diagnosis, are offered an unproven, untested course of immunotherapy. The study might offer its participants a better chance of survival, but this comes at a cost. They may be denied other courses of treatment or be subjected to unnecessary risks. Some participants will form a control group of people who are not given the therapy at all.

Now, nearly five years after she began her participation in the trial, its results have been published. They are sent to Kate in the mail. The envelope feels heavy in her hands before she opens it. How many of her fellow participants have survived?