EDITOR’S NOTE:This is a slightly revised version of my blog on Breast Cancer Awareness Month from previous years. I modify it occasionally and run it often in October to celebrate women and to continue to hope for a cure.

 

The last of the leaves hanging on to the trees aren’t the only thing that is part of the end of October. As you’ve seen here, in other media venues and nearly everywhere you look, the end of the month is also the end of Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

 

Until next October, you won’t be seeing pink ribbons as much or at all on billboards or on television commercials. The media coverage will subside. The fanfare will become less and less. You won’t see athletes with pink shoelaces, wristbands, shoes and headbands.

 

That’s OK.

 

Many of you probably already know that I am the spouse of a survivor; and there’s some really good news on that front. Valerie is now at 10 years-plus as a survivor as we’ve heard the good news from the oncologist that the tests are fine from her follow-up doctor visits. Because of that, my family and our social circle know that every month is Breast Cancer Awareness Month.

 

Yet, it’s nice to see people pay a little more attention to the ladies – and yes a few men as well – who have to endure this dreaded disease. I was reminded of it last Saturday while at the West Virginia University game with TCU. At halftime, they recognized a handful of women right out on the field for being survivors.

 

There, smack dab in the middle of the action, was my friend and all-around good egg Jill Steele. Steele, as most of you know is the principal at Simpson Elementary School, and spent last year – her first year – doing her duties while smacking cancer in the face.

 

During that time, they asked for everyone to show their admiration for survivors. I pointed to my wife and one of our friends sitting near us let everyone know about it. I feel good for my wife any time she’s recognized like that; even if it’s just a small corner of a huge crowd. I’m terribly proud of how she endured her situation and, honestly, see it as a badge of honor.

 

Whenever October comes around, I’m reminded that as much as you’d like to forget the entire ordeal, there’s a part of you that always remembers. And by remembering, it’s every detail and every second of the entire situation from discovery, to confirmation, to surgery, to chemotherapy, to radiation and recovery.

 

I was a bystander to my wife’s battle. Granted, it was a ringside seat that I was sitting in. What I was witness to during her battle was something that so few of us ever get to witness. I was a witness to grace in its purest form.

 

There’s something that takes place during a situation where the future isn’t a given. There’s something that transforms yourself and nearly everyone else around you. You begin to look at things differently. You hear things differently. You feel things differently.

 

Perhaps I first noticed it during my wife’s chemotherapy treatments. Much to my surprise, she didn’t have her treatment in some secluded room. Rather, it was in a group setting, and in that setting you see and hear the stories of others and you get to know those who are in the same fight.

 

Maybe it’s different at other facilities, but at Ruby Memorial’s Cancer Center, you are usually in a chemotherapy room with one or two other individuals in the rooms while those battling cancer are pumped with poison to combat the horrid disease in their bodies. It’s no shrine. It’s not a place of worship. It’s not even sacred ground or a spot recognized as historic by the state of West Virginia.

 

Let me assure you, though, that this room changes you. It changes you immediately, and it changes you permanently.

 

The chemotherapy room tests every emotion that you have. Not all of the emotions are bad. You experience joy, you smile and you laugh. You also experience anguish, fear, and even guilt. It is a roller coaster of emotions that you have to learn to control or else it will consume you.

 

Perhaps most perplexing was the guilt that more than once ate at my soul. There are some in treatment with you that have no one with them. Their support are the doctors and nurses. Their transportation home is by taxi. They lead a lonely existence and battle – once away from the confines of the medical facility – alone. You know it. You see it. I can assure you, you most certainly feel it. As pained as you are for your loved one, you churn emotionally because as bad as you have it, you know this person has it so much worse. All you can do is be kind, share words of hope and if it’s your thing, you pray and you pray hard.

 

The pendulum of emotion swings wildly as you wait for hours for the medicine to run its course. And it’s during this time that you bond with the others facing the battle.

 

I still can remember one of my wife’s first chemotherapy treatments as we sat in a room with a frail elderly woman. She began to tell her tale to us once conversation began. She explained to us about her dozens of chemotherapy treatments, and a body littered with tumors. Her lone request to Dr. Jame Abraham – an angel among us if there ever was one – was to keep her alive long enough to see her grandson’s high school graduation.

 

The good doctor whose bedside demeanor was only topped by his compassion, had told her very early in what had become a very long process, “Wouldn’t you rather see him graduate from college?” Once she said yes, Dr. Abraham – who has left Morgantown to do work at the Cleveland Clinic – told her they would work together to try and make that happen. She told us her tumors were all but gone and she planned on seeing that graduation from college since she had already seen the graduation from high school.

 

She was a warrior. And, as I type this, I’m somewhat certain even though I haven’t seen her since that day, she’s a survivor. I would use those same adjectives to proudly describe my wife and now I’ve added Jill Steele to that list.

 

They are survivors. They are warriors.

 

There were plenty of folks that we met during those dreadful days. I learned all I wanted to know about breast cancer, about pink ribbons and hope. I learned that hope, as the movie once said, is a powerful thing. It’s real. It sustains you.

 

And I learned of the resilience of those who fight this God-forsaken disease. I saw beauty in the women with the scarves on their bald heads that no wig or real hair could ever hope to match.

 

I think it’s wonderful that we celebrate October as Breast Cancer Awareness Month, even as it comes to its conclusion. I’ll be much happier when we celebrate the demise of breast cancer. When that happens, the celebration should never end.

 

Editor's Note: Top photo is of yours truly and my wife Valerie on a recent vacation, while Jill Steele, third from right, is shown being recognized last Saturday at WVU's home game with TCU (photo courtesy of Jill Steele).