Can a fighting spirit help conquer cancer? The limits of positivity for patients

Optimism can be a useful coping mechanism for cancer patients, specialists say, or unwelcome pressure to smile the disease away

Psychiatrist Dr. Elie Isenberg-Grzeda is familiar with symptoms of what’s been called the “tyranny” of excessive positivity.

Often what drives people with cancer to his office isn’t the diagnosis itself, but the angst and stress of trying to remain unrelentingly positive, which, implicitly or explicitly, people diagnosed with cancer are told they are supposed to do.