By Pat Muir, Yakima Herald-Republic, Wash.
Jun. 28–Barry James is 39 and has no illusions about the rare form of cancer that returned to his liver in February; he knows it’s likely to kill him.
But that’s not going to keep him from running and biking and lifting weights. It won’t keep him from teaching second grade. It won’t keep him from spending time with his wife and playing with his son.
“Realistically this stuff may catch up to me at some point,” James said. “But I’ve always said, ‘It’s not going to happen today.'”
That is the attitude that made James the winner of the Livestrong Challenge Award to be presented to him by cyclist Lance Armstrong in Portland on Sunday.
The presentation will come during the annual Livestrong Challenge, a road race and cancer fundraiser sponsored by the Lance Armstrong Foundation.
James, who has run in the event’s 5-kilometer footrace the past two years and plans to bike its 10-mile cycling race this year with his son, Aaron, was nominated for the honor by his wife, Sarah James.
A runner all his life and president of the Hard Core Run-ners Club in Yakima, James was first diagnosed with epithelioid hemangioendothelioma in October 2005.
Surgeons removed a 6-cent-imeter tumor along with his gall bladder and half of his liver. The cancer recurred the next year; two more tumors were removed. Then came the recurrence this year — eight new tumors on his liver and spots of cancer on both of his lungs.
It was a shock. He had been clean at every checkup since his last operation. He had another setback about a week ago when doctors told him the presence of cancer in his lungs ruled him out as a liver transplant candidate. Instead he will have to rely on drugs, hoping they can stunt the cancer’s growth.
But after a “grieving process,” the second-grade teacher at Apple Valley Elementary School committed himself to living life as well as he could.
“I always kind of remind myself that I really have no control over that stuff,” James said of the tumors’ recurrence. “But the other aspects of my life, I do.”
Sarah saw her husband and how he “just wouldn’t let it negatively impact his life,” and was inspired.
“Barry’s most impressive commitment to the fight against cancer is personal,” she wrote in her essay nominating him for the award. “Barry doesn’t consider himself to be someone who ‘has’ cancer. He believes he’s an individual ‘living strong’ who happens to have rare tumors on his liver and lungs.”
That perspective comes through in the speech James plans to give after Armstrong presents the award Sunday. In it, he describes how cancer has changed his life “for the better in a lot of ways.” It concludes, in typical James fashion, with a forward-looking prediction.
“I definitely plan to be back at Livestrong 2009.”
–Pat Muir can be reached at 577-7693 or [email protected].
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