Cancer Adventures

The purpose of this blog is to highlight the everyday life of a family going through cancer. We're aware that every diagnosis carries a different challenge and that we can only share our perspective on what it's like to live with a slow-growing cancer that has metastasized. Our hope is that you'll come back to visit often!

Monday, June 29, 2009

Happy kind of exhausted

I’m exhausted, but what a terrific week! We got home late last night from New Jersey with side trips into NYC, New Brunswick and Bethesda – part family vacation and part Cancer Adventure.

Highlights of the Cancer Adventure:

- Touring Gilda’s Club on Houston Street in New York - they are planning to fit our presentation into their fall line-up of events.

- Speaking at the Chordoma Foundation conference and meeting Josh and Simone Sommer who set out to find a cure for this rare form of cancer, but somewhere along the line have built a strong community.

Princeton

Exploring Princeton campus

- Meeting with Dr. Julia Rowland and her colleagues from the National Cancer Institute who laughed at all the right places in our presentation and brainstormed a bit over how our survivorship/quality of life message could be of service to them. More to report as things unfold.

Of course the frosting on the cake was spending time with family. We mixed in a bit of sight-seeing – took the ferry out to Liberty Island and meandered through Princeton campus with its lovely old stone buildings covered in ivy.

We read books to grandkids and cuddled with them as much as possible ... because all too soon they're going to be too big to cuddle with.

A pleasant outdoor meal - Seinfeld nowhere in sight

We played late-night card games with our kids, even staged a family Wii bowling tourney. I’m talking serious stuff here where the first round determined the seed and then the #1 seed played the #8, etc. I moved up in the ranks from seventh seed to play in the championship game against my highly competitive son-in-law who would never dream of giving his mother-in-law a break just to keep on good terms with her. J

And so we had to get up this morning and trudge off to our day jobs … and even though I’m exhausted, its a happy

Cookie-cutter grandkids!

kind of exhausted because there is the hope that someday soon we will be able to spend more time doing the things that are closest to our hearts – hanging with family ... and speaking encouragement and hope to those dealing with cancer.

Comment

Saturday, June 20, 2009

4:30am blog

Don't ask me why I'm writing a blog at 4:30am. We're leaving for the airport in a half hour and I'm almost packed. We'll meet our son and daughter-in-law in Philly this evening (they're flying in from Phoenix), and carpool to our daughter and son-in-law's place in New Jersey. Our whole family hasn't been together for about 4 years, so we're obviously looking forward to that.

This is also a working vacation, and we are grateful for the opportunity to meet with representatives from cancer organizations in NYC, New Brunswick and Bethesda, including the National Cancer Institute.

All that makes it worthwhile to be up at 4:30am!

Comment

Sunday, June 14, 2009

Fat check marks

It’s Sunday afternoon and in a few minutes Gary will flip a couple of turkey burgers to go with the home fries that are baking in the oven. Meanwhile, I’m enjoying the lovely temperatures on our front porch, a Chai tea in hand (notice how prominently Chai tea plays in these blogs), and thinking about all that needs to get done before we catch an early morning flight to the East Coast next Saturday.

I need to e-mail organizations to confirm our appointments; contact the young man from Novartis who approached us after our last speaking opportunity to let him know we’ll be in the area; and finish the new grant we’re writing since the deadline is coming up soon.

I’ve learned a few things as we balance full-time jobs with trying to work our way out of full-time jobs: 1) keeping a list and checking off at least one item a day makes everything much more manageable; 2) don't cancel Friday night dates, hiking, book-reading just because there’s so much to do; and 3) it will all eventually get done.

I keep a daily journal and sometimes when I begin a new month, I look back a year to see what we were doing. Invariably, I’m amazed at what we've been able to accomplish in the direction of our dreams.

		And so earlier today, we walked the 3-mile Deschutes River loop - the river busy with non-motorized boats (at left), fishermen and waterfowl. We stopped to purchase small gifts for the grandkids and books for the cross-country flight—two things checked off my list, in case you were wondering—and now this blog is finished, which means one more fat check mark!
	Deschutes River at Farewell Bend Park

Comment

Sunday, June 7, 2009

One of the benefits of cancer

Sunday afternoon has rolled around and we are resting from an exhausting but exhilarating weekend. Unofficial numbers of participants in this year’s Heaven Can Wait race to benefit the Sara Fisher Breast Cancer Project are somewhere between 3,600-3,700 … and at least 3,000 of them came through the Foot Zone (small downtown athletic apparel/shoe store) yesterday to pick up their race numbers and purchase sweatshirts, Ts and hats.

I’m getting smarter in my old age – instead of trying to do everything myself, I’m learning to delegate. With awesome volunteers covering for me under the big tent this morning, I rambled through the crowd with camcorder in hand, climbing scaffolding, shooting participants warming up to Jazzercise, getting footage of the massage therapists at work, hula hoopers doing their thing,

of runners/walkers taking off and then returning to cross the finish line.

It struck me today seeing so many people we know – my co-workers from the hospital, volunteers for the various events we've put on, and especially our cancer community friends – how enriched our lives are because of them. Which is one of the benefits of cancer.

We are grateful for what is transpiring – grateful for new perspective and vision and passion, and especially grateful for the incredible people that we otherwise would never have met.

Comment

Friday, June 5, 2009

Calm before the storm

It’s mid-afternoon on a Friday. I’m at home, enjoying a Chai tea and the calm before the storm. The storm is Heaven Can Wait, a 5K Walk/Run to benefit the Sara Fisher Breast Cancer Project of the St. Charles Cancer Program.

Heaven Can Wait

2008 Heaven Can Wait crowd

This year’s walk/run—an event founded by Charlene Levesque, breast cancer survivor—marks the tenth birthday of what has become Central Oregon’s premier sporting event in terms of participation. There were 3,400 participants in 2008, and already we are ahead of last year’s numbers in registrations.

This evening, my trusty assistant (that would be Gary) and I will help set up for tomorrow’s registration/packet pick-up and merchandise sales at the Foot Zone. Tomorrow, my trusty assistant and I will work the Foot Zone all day. And then on Sunday, my trusty assistant and I will be at the park by 6:30am to help set up under the big tent. Oh, the benefits of being married to me.

Preparation began last December with our first mailing to potential sponsors. And we’ve been mailing and meeting and organizing ever since. It’s a great event supported by an incredible community, and I’m glad to be part of it … but my trusty assistant and I will be so relieved when 1:00 Sunday afternoon rolls around!

Comment

Tuesday, June 2, 2009

Big picture thinking

Dr. Simone Sommer called a couple weeks ago. She is the mother of Josh Sommer, a Duke University student who has chordoma, a rare form of cancer. Josh and Simone established the Chordoma Foundation with the intent of finding a cure – of getting all the brilliant minds together in one room to share their findings, of establishing a bio bank so there would be chordoma cells for research.

Amazingly, in the few short years of this non-profit’s existence, Simone and Josh have done just that … and more.

We’ve been invited to be part of their community event in Bethesda, MD, at the end of June.

Dr. Simone Sommer and son, Josh

I can’t tell you how much we’re looking forward to meeting the Sommers; it's almost as if we know them already.

Simone and I brainstormed a little over promotional efforts. Could I pitch a story to our local newspaper, she asked, that could be picked up off the AP wires by someone in their area – Oregon couple dealing with cancer to meet people featured in their book of cancer heroes, including Josh and Simone Sommer of the Chordoma Foundation. Kind of a long headline, but you get the picture.

She said maybe we could get all the people in our book together – “Oprah and Ellen DeGeneres do this sort of thing,” she reminded me. So I went online to Oprah.com and submitted an idea for a show: a “reunion” of sorts, only between people who have never met each other and the couple who researched and wrote their stories.

I know, I know … a long shot. But Simone—who has managed to gather scientific minds from around the world into one room listening to each other, all in the name of finding a cure for her son’s rare cancer—has that big picture effect on me.

Comment