Read Chicken Soup for the Cancer Survivor's Soul Online
Authors: Jack Canfield
Chicken Soup for the Cancer Survivor's Soul (20 page)
I got so many flowers and cards during my stay in the hospital that staff and patients thought I was someone famous or important. They were right. I was very important to a lot of people.
I had my mastectomy on Tuesday morning, left the hospital Saturday morning, and went right to the beauty parlor to have my hair done. After all, I had a birthday party to go to on Sunday. I started chemo two weeks after my operation, and I never missed a day of school during that time. It wasn’t easy. I lost my hair. I threw up and felt sick. I had many times when I felt full of self-pity and said, “I can’t do it anymore. I can’t finish the chemo.” I remember one day crying on the phone to my mother. “What happens if after going through all of this, it comes back?”
My mother replied, “Your children need you. You’ll do whatever you have to do to be with them.” She was right. Not only did my children need me—I needed them, too. They gave me the strength to fight and go on. I had a very good life and I wasn’t ready to cash in my chips yet. I want to see my children go to college, get married and have families of their own. I want to grow old with my husband. I love my life and I intend to be here for a long time and make the most of each day.
Eileen Brown O’Riley
“I must admit, Mr. Feldmond, I like your attitude!”
Reprinted with permission from Dave Carpenter.
* Dr. Johnson’s name has been changed to protect his identity.
Searra, an eight-year-old brain tumor patient, was a “regular” in the Radiation Oncology Department, much like the other patients who came to the cancer center everyday for a five-or six-week period. With my office located near the main entrance, I could hear Searra, also called CC, coming from a distance.
Sure enough, she popped her head in every morning around 10:00 A.M. to say “hi” or, more important, to check out the toys and coloring materials I had stashed in my office. Several steps behind, CC’s grandmother, also called Mommie, since she served as her guardian, would trail in as she tried keeping up with CC’s anxious pace.
CC was not the least bit interested in hearing more about her cancer or her hair loss. When she walked into the department, it was time to socialize with the staff, who became her instant friends, and to see what kind of masterpiece she could color for Mommie before she was called back for her treatment.
I was taken aback by the love CC had for Mommie. Whenever I asked her about home life, school work or how she was feeling, every response referred to her time spent with Mommie, the funny stories they shared and how much she loved her. On numerous occasions, CC made it clear that Mommie was the center of her world.
When CC was first treated with radiation therapy, the therapists told her that they would give her a quarter each day if she promised to keep her head still on the treatment table. Certainly, after six weeks of therapy, she had a pocketful of quarters! So on the last day, the therapists wanted to know what big toy she was going to buy with all her change. CC replied, “Oh, I am not going to buy a toy. I am going to buy something for Mommie because of all the nice things she does for me.”
CC’s sincerity, unselfishness, warmth and loyalty to Mommie taught me about what is really important in life. She constantly showed that loving others with true commitment is the best gift you can give another—whether a family member or a friend. Certainly, CC has an excuse to complain or be angry at the world for a childhood totally different from the other children’s in her third-grade class. I have never heard her complain about her bald head, swollen face and body (as a result of the steroids), or low energy level, which keeps her from playing outside. CC continues to live her life the way she chooses, and that includes giving of herself to make the world a better place for others, especially Mommie.
CC reminds me to not take those people I love for granted and to look beyond the superficiality that is often found in day-to-day living. I am reminded to be more thankful for what I have today and to not dwell on what is behind me or what lies ahead. CC, just like many other cancer patients, is a true example that we aren’t always dealt the perfect hand, so we have to make the best of what we have today.
Anne C. Washburn
Manuel Garcia, a proud youthful father
Was known on his block as a hardworking man.
With a wife and a family, a job and a future
He had everything going according to plan.
One day Manuel Garcia, complaining of stomach pains
Went to the clinic to find the cause.
His body was found to have cancerous tissue
Ignoring the order of natural laws.
So Manuel Garcia of Milwaukee County
Checked into the medical complex in town.
Suddenly seeing his 39 years
Like the sand in an hourglass plummeting down.
“What are my choices?” cried Manuel Garcia.
“You’ve basically two,” was the doctor’s decree.
“Your cancer untreated will quickly be fatal,
But treatment is painful with no guarantees....”
And so it began, Manuel’s personal odyssey—
Long sleepless nights in a chemical daze
With echoes of footsteps down long lonely corridors
Tolling his minutes and hours away.
With the knowledge that something inside was consuming him
Manuel Garcia was filled with despair.
He’d already lost 40 pounds to the cancer,
And now to the drugs he was losing his hair.
After nine weeks in treatment the doctor came calling,
Said, “Manuel, we’ve done about all we can do.
Your cancer could go either way at this juncture;
It’s out of our hands and it’s now up to you.”
He looked in the mirror, a sad frightened stranger
So pale, so wrinkled, so lonely, so scared.
Diseased, isolated, and feeling unlovable—
One-hundred-twenty-six pounds and no hair.
He dreamed of his Carmen at 60 without him,
His four little children not having their Dad,
Of Thursday night card games at Julio’s,
And everything else he’d not done that he wished that he had.
Awakened from sleep on the day of his discharge
By shuffling feet going all around his bed,
Manuel opened his eyes and thought he was still dreaming—
His wife, and four friends with no hair on their heads.
He blinked and he looked again, not quite believing
The four shiny heads all lined up side by side.
And still to that point not a word had been spoken,
But soon they were laughing so hard that they cried.
And the hospital hallways were ringing with voices.
“Patron, we did this for you,” said his friends.
And they wheeled him out to the car they had borrowed
“Amigo, estamos contigo, ves...”
So Manuel Garcia returned to his neighborhood
Dropped off in front of his two-bedroom flat.
And the block seemed unusually deserted for Sunday;
He drew a deep breath and adjusted his hat.
But before he could enter the front door flew open.
Manuel was surrounded with faces he knew—
Fifty-odd loved ones and friends of the family
With clean-shaven heads and the words “We love you!”
And so Manuel Garcia, a person with cancer,
A father, a husband, a neighbor, a friend,
With a lump in his throat said, “I’m not one for speeches,
But here I have something that needs to be said.
“I felt so alone with my baldness and cancer.
Now you stand beside me, thank Heaven above.
For giving me strength that I need may God Bless you,
And long may we live with the meaning of love.
“For giving me strength that I need may God Bless you,
And long may we live with the meaning of love.”
David Roth
Everybody in our family has different hair. My papa’s hair is short. He doesn’t have much, but it suits him. And me, my hair is long and straight. Not a curl if I try. Just straight down past my shoulders. Jeff’s hair is great. It is thick and soft. It has body and can be shaped. Very different from my dad’s hair now, but it was once the same.
But my mother’s hair, my mother’s, well it’s not really hair. She has cancer so she lost it all. It’s growing back, though, and so soft. Like fur. Fuzzy. Soft to touch and soft to the face when she’s holding you and you feel safe, it is the warm smell of a baby, it is the smell of comfort when you cuddle up next to her, and she tickles your back letting you know she loves you. All your worries and troubles disappear when she holds you. When I rub her head it is like rubbing a magic lamp. I wish for her to be happy and healthy, and for all her beautiful hair to come back to protect and keep her head warm the way she protects and keeps me warm. That’s Mama’s hair, like a baby. Soft and warm like her heart.
Jaime Rosenthal
Saint Christopher’s Protection
Dear Jacqueline:
When you read this letter, it will be Father’s Day. I want to tell you a wonderful story about your dad. He is a pretty private person and I’m afraid he might never tell you himself. It is a story that you should know—and perhaps one day pass on to your children.
Your father and I had been friends for years. On a hot August day in 1992 in Boise, Idaho, I met him for lunch. You see, I had cancer and was leaving to begin the long process of a bone marrow transplant at Stanford University Hospital. I was optimistic, but bone marrow transplants are dangerous procedures. It was possible that I would never see your father again and I wanted to tell him good-bye. I was only 39 when I was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, an unusual cancer for someone so young. Worse yet, the only course of treatment at the time of the original diagnosis was chemotherapy for the rest of my life, which at best would have been only 10 years longer.
The doctors at Stanford determined that I had potential as a bone marrow transplant candidate. It was a possible cure, but my cancer didn’t fit the standard treatment regimen. After hours of uncomfortable tests, difficult discussions and refusal of coverage by my insurance company, I was still determined that I would have that transplant! With my whole heart and soul I tried to convince the Stanford doctors that I could be an exceptional patient. They finally agreed, but they had to write a new protocol, just for me. Yes, I was going to have a bone marrow transplant!
Your dad was pretty shocked to see me when I arrived for our lunch. A brunette with naturally curly hair, I showed up that day with a blond page-boy. It was a wig to replace the hair I had lost after seven months of chemotherapy. Instead of trying to find a wig that matched my natural hair, I had the page-boy style that I had always wanted in high school. Facing cancer taught me to take risks and try new things. I had learned that life is short and that I should follow my dreams. “Later” might be too late.
Over our meal, the two of us laughed about stories from the past and talked about my terrifying present and unknown future. As you can imagine, it was saying goodbye that I dreaded. As we stood on the sidewalk in front of my car, your dad reached into his pocket and handed me an envelope. Immediately, the words “Saint Christopher medal” flashed into my mind, and I don’t know why because neither he nor I am Catholic. He said, “This is for you, but don’t open it until you are on the airplane bound for California.” He kissed me on the cheek and was gone.
Two days later, shortly after take-off, I opened that envelope. It was, indeed, a Saint Christopher medal—a very special one. On one side of the silver pendant was the U.S. Army’s emblem and on the other, Saint Christopher. Your father’s enclosed note to me read:
Dear Cindy,