Cancer Surviving: 12 Years and Counting

Oct 16, 2008 by Chris Brewer

13 Comments

• Tweet

Today is a big day for me and this is a big week in my life. 12 years ago I sat in a military urologist’s office, having done a weekend’s worth of internet research via Alta Vista and Yahoo and told her, “I think I’m here to get a diagnosis of testicular cancer.” She laughed politely and said, “If you don’t mind, I’ll be the judge of that,” went out and looked at my charts and scans, came back in and said, “You’re scheduled for surgery in five hours.” An hour after recovering I was making phone calls I never thought I would to my family and friends, telling them that I had cancer.

Fortunately significant progress had been made in the fight against this particular disease, and thanks to more surgery and a couple of rounds of chemotherapy I was as clear as one could possibly hope for, but my life had certainly changed. Not long after I started the Testicular Cancer Resource Center website with Doug Bank, and then in early 1997 I met and interviewed Lance Armstrong. At the time we were the only guys we knew who had been through similar treatments and were at similar points in our recovery. As we spoke he told me about this little Foundation he was starting and ?¢?Ǩ?Äú as we did back in the day ?¢?Ǩ?Äú I volunteered to help with the website and Ride for the Roses cycling event. To say that was one of my better decisions is certainly an understatement…

Another good decision I made was asking my girlfriend Helen to marry me last Christmas eve. And so on this day where I celebrate 12 years of cancer survivorship, I’m also starting a new chapter in my life this weekend with my new partner, friend, and wife. The way I ask people to celebrate along with me is to simply find someone that you care about and tell them you love them. You can’t do that often enough, and as cancer survivors around the world will tell you, you never know how much time you have left to do so.

Still living strong here in Austin ?¢?Ǩ?Äú Chris…