How Cancer Affected My Life

Editor’s Note - At the recent Senior Honors night, several students were awarded scholarships from Pass on Joy, in memory of Marc Stringer. The students wrote on how cancer affected their lives. The stories so moved me when I read them that I knew they needed to be shared with the community. I received permission from the students,before printing here.

In 2019, I was told my best friend, the person who helped raise me, my grandma, my Nae, had cancer. As an 11-year-old, I was heartbroken but also optimistic. I was a very aware child; my parents never hid things like that from me, so I knew what it meant. 

When my mom tried explaining to me what kind it was, there wasn’t a name for it. All I knew was that it started in a part of her stomach that had been surgically removed or cut off, so food never touched it and spread. We tried every treatment there is, you name it there's a good chance we did it. Radiation, chemo, diet changes the whole nine yards, nothing helped, nothing ever worked. She was notoriously stubborn, so she never quit working. 

Every day, farmers went into Greenway and knew Renee Bock could hook them up with whatever they needed cause she knew what she was talking about, then she'd let them take a piece of candy for the road. Through it all, we quickly came to terms with the fact that there was no healing it, so we just had fun while we still could. We went to Mount Magazine, where she went to a girls' camp when she was my age, Silver Dollar City, forcing my mom on roller coasters, loved E.T. (her favorite movie) at Universal, and spent the whole summer going around the woods around our house. When we were at Universal we also got her an E.T. plush, and soon after coming home, she ended up back in the hospital, and my mom and E.T. went with her. As always, they connected every tube and machine, including a heart rate monitor that had a bright red light in it, and when she was holding the plush, the light made his hand glow like in the movie, and as she always did, the iconic line of “E.T. phone home” followed in the voice in all. 

When it got to the point that she could barely leave bed, we knew it was the downhill slide. My mom basically moved into the house she grew up in to help and was there for at least a month before the time came, we had to say goodbye. The second I walked in the door and saw friends and family, I was in complete denial and refused to even go in the same room as her. I never did, I looked at her through the window of the door and walked away. I regret that every day, but even more when I realize I don’t remember her voice. I can’t even get the E.T. plushy, her old greenway hoodie, or her favorite cup because they were buried with her, but I couldn't have imagined it any other way. I couldn’t even tell you a time I saw her in a dress. Nae wasn’t the only person in my family that has or has had cancer, but she was definitely the one that affected my life the most.