Back in 2016, the Tumbler Ridge News did a feature on cancer survivors. Both Frank and Grace had at the time. Here’s a portion of Grace’s part of the story.
Grace is such a common face on the Tumbler Ridge landscape, that when she’s not there—serving burgers, taking tickets and just generally being the lubricant that keeps events moving here in Tumbler Ridge—it is painfully obvious.
And there was a period of time, not that long ago, where she was conspicuously absent.
Having watched her husband go through dealing with colon cancer, Grace decided that she should get a colonoscopy as well. “The reason I went in is because my mother had colon cancer when she was 63,” says Grace. “They managed to remove that and she was fine. But with my mother having it, I thought it might run in the family.”
So almost exactly a year after Frank’s bout with cancer, Grace went in to be checked out. “There was a small polyp that they removed that was a concerned.”
Grace wasn’t quite as lucky as Frank. Her cancer not only affected her colon, it had moved into her reproductive organs as well. “We went to Vancouver in early February, just a week before the Olympics. I asked if I could go to Edmonton, but Edmonton is no longer taking BC patients. It wasn’t long before they were calling me: What would I do, where would I stay. I thought it was so nice they were on this so immediately.”
She met with the radiologist at the BC Cancer clinic who told her all about the cancer (“he even drew me a diagram,” she says), and how they would have to treat her after the operation. “Rather than giving me the chemo with an injection, he said he would give it to me in a pill. I thought I would jump into his arms; I didn’t want the injections.”
It took just over four hours to complete the operation. The tumor was in the fat cells near to her anus, so she had to have an ostomy. When the surgeon discussed the possibility beforehand, Grace was stoic. “I won’t be the first, I won’t be the last. Other people have put up with it, and I will, too. I have to think positive about it.” They also gave her a hysterectomy.
In two days, she was up and about, and was dismissed from the recovery ward. Everything seemed to be going so well for Grace. Unfortunately, appearances can be deceiving. “I was feeling my abdomen, and it just wasn’t the way it should be. I was feeling puffier and puffier. So I went in to see my surgeon, and she said ‘I think you have an infection.’ But yet I didn’t feel sick. I didn’t have a fever, I didn’t have the cold shakes. But she took the bandage off and pulled two staples and oh this infection, like water.’”
It took months, but by Christmas, the infection had finally cleared up.
Along the way, Grace decided to start volunteering with the Canadian Cancer Society. She was integral to the daffodil fundraiser, as was Frank and the rest of the Lions. She says she knows too many people in Tumbler Ridge who have cancer. “If you look at the four houses on the other side of the street, and then you count the four houses on this side of the street, there’s at least six cancer survivors.
“Everybody has cancer, you just don’t know how it will affect you. What causes these cells to become tumors. So many questions, and they still don’t have all the answers.”
Trent is the publisher of Tumbler RidgeLines.
