TRAVERSE CITY —June is National Cancer Survivor Month, a time to recognize those that have stayed strong through their journey with the disease.
Stephen Hayes thought his cancer journey was over, but 35 years later he started experiencing familiar symptoms.
“It’s a journey that never really, truly ends, but began in halloween of 1987 when i got sick,” says Haynes. “And my mom at that point, tried her best to stay calm and rushed me to the emergency room and the Pediatrician on call sent us to Detroit Children’s Hospital. And we met with a Neurologist down there and ordered an MRI and discovered a brain tumor, Medulloblastoma. And they decided that they needed to do surgery the very next day.”
Stephen Haynes was diagnosed with cancer at the age of 3 and continued to experience symptoms from that before the age of 10.
“It was followed by radiation for a couple weeks of five days every day, and then, of course, you know, you think, okay, yeah. Cancer’s gone. Journeys over,” continues Haynes. “I had some side effects that I dealt with over the next couple of years and, you know, tumor, tremors and shakiness at five and six.”
Stephen thought his battle was over but then 35 years later, he started noticing symptoms that were cause for concern.
“So it was really interesting how the journey continues. Like I said, it kind of fell off and i didn’t really track it and thought, you know, I beat this and i didn’t need to, over the last five years I started getting some headaches, but i was able to, you know, justify them, write them off to various other things.”
“In his case, we had imaging to confirm that there there were two meningioma in the head,” says Justine Pearl, MD in Neurology at Munson Medical Center. “And when you get into his history and you understand that he had that radiation history in his childhood, we know that a couple decades later, it can happen that you get the so-called radiation induced meningioma.”
Haynes underwent two surgeries in the last year to remove those tumors.
Dr. Pearl stresses the importance of not ignoring symptoms as they arise.
“I think that that is probably one of the most heartbreaking parts for me about the cancer journey,” says Dr. Pearl. “I know that is a very hard pill to swallow, but it’s important to remember that you’re not alone and you have that support. He has that support in us and our team here at Munson. And I think that patients will get different scans and, and they’re kind of declared cancer free. But it’s also important to remember that this is something that needs constant vigilance and attention.”
And Stephen has a message to anyone going through something similar.
“The odds are the odds, but they can be beaten. I mean, when I was diagnosed on January 24th, there was a 20% survival rate for five years,” says Haynes. “Keep doing the things that make you happy. Live in the moment. And there is always hope. Hope is the cornerstone of the cancer journey. It’s not just your hope. It’s your caregivers hope, your friends, your families.”