Keep Your Eye on the Ball

What started as a joke ended up setting in motion some unsolicited medical advice from total strangers… and may have saved the life of a young man.

Here’s how it goes: 18-year-old kid is rooting around in his medicine cabinet, finds a pregnancy test kit left behind by his ex-girlfriend, thinks it would be a laugh and a half to pee on the stick. Surprise: The test comes out positive. That’s weirdly funny, so his gal pal in Hamilton, Ontario, draws a comic strip about it and posts it to Reddit.

The comic artist in question, who informally goes by “CappnPoopdeck,” told CBC news that she only drew the strip to tease her buddy. One doubts she spent much time considering that a pregnancy test checks for certain substances, and that that her friend might be harbouring hormones that just aren’t supposed to be brewing inside a healthy male.

Poopy, therefore, was astonished when her comic attracted a slew of comments from concerned strangers who wrote: “Check yourself for testicular cancer.”

“Whoa.. just saw all the cancer comments,” she responded online. She promised to pass the info on to her friend, and added: “Thank you for letting me know guys, we may have dodged a bullet here!”

Creative expression – and the kindness of strangers – may indeed have caught a cancer in time. The young man saw his doc, a small tumour was found, but it can be treated. Not only did Poopy post a full report on Reddit, she also, naturally, drew a comic about it. She even urged people to check themselves for testicle and breast lumps, helpfully adding the URL of a health website. Poopy is the kind of pal you want to have. “Thank you again, Reddit,” she wrote in her comic. “Namaste.”

Oh, the stigma…