The Little Engine That Could

My Dad is in the hospital with late-stage cancer. He was diagnosed with an aggressive form of prostate cancer more than 19 years ago and given six months to live. The tricky part of that diagnosis is that he had an eight year-old at the time, and dying wasn't a particularly convenient option. So he didn't. Or he wouldn't. He went to Washington University for a horrifically experimental treatment that destroyed his general health, but kept the actual cancer at bay for awhile. It came back. He banished it. Repeat. Then it came back when Caro was more or less grown up, though still in college, and he decided to try to just keep it at bay, but not vanquish it. It settled in his bones and made his life pretty miserable, but time passed and my dad became a medical anomaly/miracle who lived and lived without any seeming justification for it.

Tuesday night the paramedics took my dad to the hospital, dehydrated, unable to walk, and dizzy. He had excellent care at home, but there's only so much you can do when your body just tires of the fight. Mom stays at the hospital all day and evening, knitting like a fiend to keep the stress to a dull roar. Emily and Jim go visit, Suzy, Caro, and I call incessantly to check in. We try to keep him cheerful and happy, but we can't fix this.

How does a perfectly healthy 54 year-old man end up with a deadly cancer? It happens every day to someone, doesn't it? One of those "mysteries" that we just have to accept.

Except that we KNOW how he got cancer.















"Leaving for war", August 1966 and "Homecoming", August 1967

My father went to Viet Nam in August 1966 and returned a year later with a deadly toxin already sitting in his cells, biding its time until it could end my dad's life. Don't believe me? Check it out:

Agent Orange, Vietnam Veterans and Prostate Cancer

My dad refused to file for compensation from the military. His feelings were and are that serving in the Army was an honor and a sacrifice made willingly, and exposure to Agent Orange was just an occupational hazard. It's a shame that he got cancer, but so did a lot of other people so why should he be an exception?

That's very honorable, and those words came as no surprise to any of us that know him.

But I'm still mad about it. Two of my nephews serve in the military, one as a combat medic headed for his second tour in the Middle East, another in language school with the Marines. My son wants to fly for the Air Force. I'm not anti-military. But I'm still very ticked off that so many thousands of men have had agonizingly painful deaths from exposure to a chemical that completely devastated a country, its people, and our own people with no lasting benefit to anyone. We lost that "police action", so-called since there was never a declaration of war. We will lose this one. And 40 years from now someone's father might very well be dying of a preventable cancer after exposure to God-knows-what in Afghanistan back during that disaster of a war. That is not a reflection on our leaders or our soldiers. I firmly believe they are doing their absolute best and doing heroic things every single day.

But all wars eventually end, no matter how many battles are won along the way.

I have added a link to my Dad's CarePage on the right sidebar. If you would like to see updates on his condition, you will need to register with their site.