DayeTime: Relentless

Everyday we see death notices of individuals who had finally lost their long-running battle with cancer. We do not see the stories behind that obit — the stories of a family’s tragedies, trials and triumphs during that war.

This column has one particular Avoyelles Parish family in mind, but the names will not be used because it can apply to so many families who have endured this same circumstance in the past or who are going through it now. Unfortunately, there are families out there who are currently unaware that they will some day face this situation.

“Cancer” is a word we use when speaking about other individuals and other families. It is not a word we use for our family — until we do.

“I always thought it would be heart disease that did me in,” the matriarch of the family in this column said. “Years of eating pork, not much exercise and a family history of heart problems always put this No. 1 on my concerns.”

Apparently that heart was too full of love for her husband, children and grandchildren to have any room for disease.

Like a lightning bolt shooting down from a cloudless blue sky, striking without warning, she and her husband sat before a somber doctor who had to deliver news he had delivered so many times before.

“You have Stage 4 cancer.”

Most readers know there is no “Stage 5.”

The decision was made to fight the disease, with the hope that 21st Century medical science combined with 1st Century faith would be enough to send this particular demon back to the depths it came from.

The fight was not easy. There were times where it was unclear which was worse — the “cure” or the disease.

After several months that seemed like years, the chemotherapy was finished and a CT scan showed that all of the tumors that had been present were gone.

The joy of victory was all too brief. Within two years, a six-month checkup revealed more tumors had returned.

The brave woman, and her thunderstruck family, once again prepared to fight an invading enemy and drive it back into the sea.

The second battle took more of a toll on the victim than the first, but she showed a brave face and always spoke optimistically.

Those watching her closely would probably have noticed she held the young grandchildren a little longer and a little tighter.

Once again, the final scan after the completion of treatment showed no cancerous tumors.

“You kicked cancer’s butt — hard,” one of her sons told her.

She and her family had no reason to believe otherwise.

Until a year later when her second six-month scan after that victory revealed more tumors had returned.

This time the doctor told her that there were two things she needed to understand and accept.

First, don’t give up. “You have had good results twice before and there is no reason to believe the treatment will not be successful this time.”

Second, “It is not realistic to expect to be ‘cured.’ Reality is you will probably never be ‘cancer-free.’ The cancer will keep coming back until it eventually takes your life. That could be two years from now or 20. We cannot say for sure. What I can tell you is that my experience with this kind of cancer is that it will come back.

“It is a relentless adversary,” the doctor said, “and all I can tell you is that you need to be just as relentless in fighting it.”

The brave woman and her supportive family are currently halfway through their third battle with cancer.

If you ask them how they are doing, they say they are optimistic that the cancer will once again be driven back. They also will say they believe the “remission” period will be much longer.

A long time ago — by American measurement of time — a small band of the Nez Perce tribe rebelled against the United States after the federal government unilaterally changed the terms of a treaty that forced the tribe onto a small reservation and revoked the hunting and fishing rights they had been promised on their ancestral territories.

For five months in 1877 Chief Joseph and his band of warriors, women and children fought a relentless enemy who would not give up its pursuit.

The Nez Perce scored victories and evaded the pursuing “blue coats,” but eventually the tribe was cornered and had to surrender.

With many of the tribe’s leaders and warriors dead, and with the women and children freezing to death and starving, Chief Joseph delivered what could be called the epitaph of the Native American resistance: “I will fight no more forever.”

Some day this family may have to follow Chief Joseph’s example and accept that fighting is no longer an option.

But today is not that day.

Today is a day to fight, to fight for even one more day.

Today is a day to love, to fit 30 years of love in what may only be a few.

Today is a day to hope that miracles can happen and that a long, if not complete, “cease fire” with this enemy can be achieved.

When I look at this family’s — and so many other families’ -- experience, I would have to say that if a family spends its last years together “fighting the good fight,” holding onto hope and expressing their love for one another, then the enemy has already lost.