LiveStrong

I would like to take today to express my hope that one day we will not live in fear of cancer.  That some types of cancer won't be considered a death sentence, that stage four won't be more fearful than stage 1.  I pray God will guide the researchers to find targeted therapies no more ravishing on the body than an antibiotic, like those taken for an ear infection.  Unfortunately today, with cancer, the cure can be as bad as the disease.

As most of you know, I lost my mother this past August to leukemia.  Her leukemia was a very aggressive form, the type that victims of Hiroshima and Nagasaki suffered from after the bombs were dropped. And hers may very well have been just as "man made" as theirs.

My mom, Mary Steiner

In 1986-7, my mother underwent chemotherapy for breast cancer.  Around 2004 she developed MDS (Myelodysplastic Syndrome), a form of pre-leukemia which can be caused by previous chemotherapy.  She was one of the unfortunates whose MDS turned into a virulent form of leukemia.

By this time, she was too old to withstand the treatments necessary to fight her cancer, even if the doctors had effective treatments for her type of leukemia (which they don't).  Too often this is the case with thousands of people each year, and not just ones with leukemia.  As far as we have come, there is so far yet to go.

So I take a moment to remember those who have been lost - my neighbor Jeff who never smoked, to lung cancer; my co-worker Jim, who did smoke, also to lung cancer; Animal Shelter Volunteer Life's Kevin's beloved Auntie Kathy, Zoolatry's sweet Poppy Vic, and of course, my mother. I know many of you have lost loved ones too, and I dedicate this moment to them as well.  You are all sorely missed.  We love you.