My Secret Weapon: Cancer Came, It Saw, I won

The Worst Headache Ever!

 Do you know those headaches you get when you lick the ice cream way too fast; even though your Mom warned you ahead of time not to do it? I got one of those headaches one day, and it didn’t go away for three years. The worst part was that I didn’t even have any ice cream on the first day that I got the headache. 

Three long days went by. After watching enough movies that even a little kid could get sick of watching movies, I was still crying away, about how bad my head hurt. Finally, Mom grabbed her keys on one Friday morning.

“Billy,  we’re going to see Doctor Tommy. Get your shoes on.” 

“Can we take Lucy with us?”

“Billy,  Doctor Tommy doesn’t let dogs inside his office. This is the last time I’m gonna tell you. Get your shoes on.”

We could have seen a million and ten cars on the way to the doctor with a sign on the side of their car that said, “Look out the window, Billy, and we’ll give you four million bags of M&M’s,” I still wouldn’t have gotten a single piece of free candy on the way to Dr. Tommy’s office.

After we got there, Nurse Brenda took my mom and I into the patient’s room. The place looked like the time my art teacher made us all draw a bunch of pictures about how to not get sick. 

Drawing a bunch of stupid pictures  in Mrs. Zamaddux’s room would have been way better than what I was about to go through. 

 Nurse Brenda said, “ Dr. Tommy will be here in just a few minutes.”  

From what my mom tells me, I cried even louder while we were waiting, than the time my little sister Olivia bawled when I socked her in the belly after she beat me at some stupid Hula Hoop game. 

Dr. Timmy finally came in. 

“Hey Billy. What’s the matter, Bud?”

“My eyes hurt, my head hurts.”

Then, I started to cry some more. 

After I finally stopped crying, he did his usual thing. He looked in between my ears, and down my throat, and a bunch of other stuff. After that,  he told me to sleep a lot, drink a bunch of water, and he gave me the pink medicine that he always used to give me. This medicine was more reliable than John Graden’s throws to Marco Rivera. Only this time, the medicine didn’t work.

Bulls Go Up, Chickens Go Down!

Well. If my body was a quarterback, it threw an interception to what would be the meanest cornerback in the NFL. However, this CB did not wear a jersey, and only lived inside some people’s bodies. Its name was Cancer. On November 11, 2018, I was diagnosed with Brain Cancer. 

For my whole life before I got cancer, my dad used to tell my sister Olivia and I at least once a week, “Ya ‘ see kids. If you plop a bull and a chicken right in the middle of a mountain, the bull will keep charging up the hill, and the chicken will go back down. The bottom of the mountain is no place to be either, kids. The view is uglier than the view from the bottom of Olivia’s room when she doesn’t throw her clothes in the hamper. So, I can only pray that I am raising a pair of bulls.” 

On the day that they told me that I had cancer,  I knew from the second the words came out of Dr. Tommy’s mouth that I had to Bull Up, I had to win!.

My Two Secret Weapons

Eventually,  I thought of two things that could give me the strength and the courage to  Bull Up. The first one came to me as easy as beating my sister at basketball. This weapon was watching John Graden throw touchdown passes. No matter how sick I felt, I spent at least two hours every day watching his highlights on ESPN. For me, his ESPN clips felt better than the time our football team won the Pee-Wee Championship.

The other thing that helped me Bull Up was playing for my own football team. Over the last three years of getting all these cancer treatments, it didn’t matter how many times that I threw up the night before, or how dizzy I felt even just minutes before the game; I still went to almost every practice, and 100 % of my games.  At the end of every practice or game, Coach Thomas would lead all the kids in a prayer to ask God to keep giving his little warrior , Bodacious, the power to fight on,  (READ HERE ABOUT BODACIOUS) Bodacious was the name Coach Thomas gave me.

I won 

Now, I’m going to mash up a bowl of truth.

Two days before John Graden threw six touchdowns to help the San Diego JackRabbits win the 2021 Super Bowl, I was as close to death as John Graden was to winning the league MVP during his rookie season.

One morning after one of my treatments, things got extremely scary. I had stopped breathing, This meant all the nurses and all the doctors in the entire hospital had to come into my room to help save me. 

I’m not sure if it were a couple of minutes or a couple of hours later, but I was plopped down on my bed in the position of an angel, with a football in his hand. The ball was actually in my hand, Truth Mash.  That was when my mom, dad, and sister tip-toed into the room like they were looking at a ghost.  Later on, Olivia said that the beeping machines were driving her crazy, but she could forgive me because I almost died.  

All three of them crowded around my bed, and held onto my hand.  Then, my eyes opened up. I said, “Is the JackRabbits game on yet?”

My dad just grabbed my head and said, “Two more days buddy. Two more days. Through all of this,you’ve never been a chicken. I’m proud of you buddy. Keep fighting. Bull up!” 

After that, my mom and my sister started to cry; even though Olivia will never admit to it. I still remember her weeping. 

I really do believe that the only reason that I was able to keep fighting was because I didn’t want to miss that game. And, guess what, two days later, The Jack Rabbits won the game. It was mostly due to the fact that Graden threw six touchdown passes!

The Real WIn- Getting Out Of The Hospital

Two days after the San Diego Jack Fires won the big game, the doctors at the San Diego County Children’s hospital declared that I was starting to improve, a lot. So, they took me to do a special procedure to look at my brain. 

When the doctor came into my hospital room after the procedure, his feet shuffled as he stood in front of my bed. He looked down at the floor. I could hear the beeping machines coming from a ton of directions. 

He popped his head up. He looked at my mom, my dad, my sister, and my nurses. Then, he opened up the envelope he was holding in his hand, with a picture of my brain.

“You know what this is, Billy?”

“A picture that says I don’t have Brain Cancer anymore? At least, I hope.”

“It is, Congratulations!”

The doctor turned to my mom and dad.

“This boy fights like a bull. I have never seen a recovery so fast, in my 27 years of treating patients with cancer.” 

On the way home,  I said to my mom and dad, “What can we do to celebrate that I beat cancer?” They both said together, “Anything, of course. “ 

“Really? Like go to the San Diego Jack Rabbits Home Opener Next Year?”

My sister rolled her eyes since she hated football. But, my dad gave my mom his credit card so she could order the tickets before we even got home. 

Sign It Up!

The day before the game finally arrived. My sister Olivia had an idea. “Hey, how about you make one of those signs that we see fans holding up on TV sometimes?”

“What should I put on it?”

She said, “I don’t know. How about John Graden Helped Me NOT DIE?”

“Shut up, Stupid!”

After we argued about who is dumber, we settled on, “John Graden Helped Me Beat Brain Cancer.” 

Dad drove us to the game the next morning.The game  started off kind of slow and boring. There were only like a couple of touchdowns during the first couple of hours of the game. But, the big moment eventually came in the fourth quarter. 

“Here’s the snap. “

“Graden!”

“Looking left.”

“Dodges the sack.” 

“He’s got a man.”

….

“It’s Rivera!”

“He’s off to the races.”

“Touch down, San Diego!!”

I don’t actually know if that was what the announcer said. But, it had to sound something pretty similar to that. I do know what happened at Jack Ryan Stadium, and it was freaking awesome.  

After the touchdown, John Graden ran past the end zone, and right for the seats. He just so happened to be running towards the same seats that we were sitting in.  

Olivia took off my JackRabbits hat, and slapped me right across the noggin, "Put up your sign."

“John Graden Helped Me Beat Brain Cancer.”  

I never thought John Graden would see the sign, or anything like that when Olivia told me to make the sign.

But,  there he was,  my hero, the quarterback for the San Diego JackRabbits.

Graden put his hand up for a high-five.

 Even though I was higher up than him, he didn't do that stupid thing my dad used to do when I was real short  when he gives me a high-five.  My dad used to put his hand up and make me think that I would be able to jump up and touch his hand. At the last freaking second, he pulled  his hand away. 

After we high-fived,  he looked at me and said,  “I'm really glad to meet you,  Kid. You are the true hero.”

I tried to act as cool as I could. But, I felt like I had just floated away, up into heaven.  

To be honest,  now I feel like it was kind of worth it to have had all those needles stuck inside me for the last three years, since now I know what it feels like to have the greatest quarterback of all time call me HIS hero.

Follow-Up

Based on a true story about a remarkable hero named Noah Reed's interaction with NFL Legend, Tom Brady. Learn more HERE