Transcriber: Take A Mile Reviewer: Maxime Malalel
I climbed out of the water in Beijing,
and all of a sudden everything changed.
Everything has changed
because I [became] Olympic champion.
And nothing was the same as before.
A man believes what he wants to believe
and disregards the rest.
So I got back to my room in the Olympic Village.
And I opened my email box
and I had over 500 emails from all over the world.
People telling me I was so amazing.
People telling me I was amazing,
sometimes because I was Olympic champion,
but mostly, because I recovered from leukemia.
Even a week later, the Prime Minister of the Netherlands,
he called me a hero.
A hero for inspiring people.
So I think that had something to do
with the leukemia as well.
Flattering words,
flattering words.
A man believes what he wants to believe
and disregards the rest.
Flattering words.
But if you think about it -
What a bullshit!
What a bullshit.
And it even makes me mad.
Right from the beginning
after becoming Olympic champion,
almost all people wanted me to say
I became Olympic champion
after beating the hell out of cancer.
And today I want to speak
about two questions I have.
About the influence of the patient himself
in his cancer survival rate.
The first question is:
How true is it ?
And the second question is:
How bad is it?
The first question is quite easy,
because scientifically
the medical research
is absolutely clear about it.
The patient doesn't have any influence
on his own cancer survival rate.
None.
Nothing.
And still a lot of people don't believe that.
How come?
A man believes what he wants to believe
and disregards the rest.
And I think we have our answer right over there.
I think we believe that a cancer patient
has a lot of influence himself,
because we want to believe that.
Because it's a nice thought for the patient.
It's a nice thought for people who love that patient.
It's a nice thought for healthy people as well.
Because the healthy people they think
in worst-case scenario,
if I get cancer one day,
I'll be tough,
I'll think positive,
I'll fight my way through.
So it's a nice thought for everyone.
But still I've never said
I had influence on that.
And that brings me to the second question:
How bad is it?
Well, there's one group of people
which this thought, it's not a nice thought for.
And there are the people who don't make it.
It's for Rob and Bob,
my friends in the hospital.
When I was just laying,
almost being lazy on my hospital bed,
just being so ill,
they were doing all kinds of almost weird stuff.
They were doing fitness,
[unclear] in the hospital room.
They were going on their home trainer
on a bike to stay fit to fight the cancer.
And guess what?
They were the persons that did not make it.
And that's why for me it feels so bad
to say that I had influence
on my own cancer survival rate.
And that's why I can't be proud
of the fact I survived cancer.
Because for saying that
It feels like telling Rob and Bob
they did not work hard enough.
And that feels so wrong.
And that's why, if people...
(Applause)
And that's why if people call me a hero
because I am recovered from cancer
I always laugh a bit silly
because I know who the real heroes are.
Some think completely different
because they prefer the truth
and not just a nice thought.
Thank you for listening.
(Applause)