Awaking to find herself in a place she didn’t know, machines blaring and people rushing in to see what is the matter. “You aren’t lucky to be alive, you are blessed,” the doctor told Nancee Beamer, 58 at the time, awaking from a year and a half long coma. “It was like awaking from a dream, like on a slide going faster and faster toward a big bright light.” Rare and cancerous tumors in the brain causing a seizure and eventual collapse at her home in Seattle, Washington. Four surgeries spanning over 12 years trying to remove the malignant growths has left her head scarred with trenches, soft spots, and divots. The cancer has metastasised throughout her body. “We all have challenges, welcome to life 101.” Nancee smiles and coughs, her lungs filled with fluid and tumors.
Before being diagnosed herself, Nancee already knew the devastation of this devil known as cancer. Serving in the Peace Corps in South Africa, Nancee met Anselmo DeLibero, a Brazilian bodybuilder who was also volunteering. They were married three years after their time with the Peace Corps. was completed Six happy years later Nancee awoke one morning to her husband’s panicked yelps, Anselmo stumbling out of the bathroom due to the pain and blood he’d vomited. She rushed him to the nearest hospital where the doctors diagnosed it as liver and pancreatic cancer. Having had this for a very long time Anselmo brushed it off as pain from his workout regiment, he unexpectedly died three days later.
Nancee has had a unique experience with this debilitating disease, but the way she is handling it is very unique. “I am not going to be some dumbo doped out of her mind, I am going to enjoy the time I have left.” Many treatments such as chemo or surgery leave participants looking like walking corpses. Nancee has chosen an alternative path. Mayo Clinic is a non profit organization for testing new drugs, medicine and other therapies. According to Mayoclinic.org, Nancee is one out of 6 left with her type of cancer. There were originally 160 in the study according to Nancee. Many great things have come from the Mayo Clinic, including discovering how to grow heart cells from stem cells, creating standards for treating pain in cancer patients as well as many more medical triumphs. The study she is participating in is a new treatment for brain cancer. The clinics are totally anonymous except for the doctors whom volunteer or act as the middleman for the Clinic and the patient.
Settling down at Treeo, a retirement community in Orem, Nancee spends most her time reading the copious amounts of hardback books she has collected over the years. She also does script editing for the man who wrote movies such as Saints and Soldiers and The Work and the Glory. Matt Whitaker. “[she] is my literal pal, my partner in crime," Mr. Whitaker has stated about Nancee. He has also thanked her in many award ceremonies, saying he wouldn’t be there if not for her. She also works for the MTC, this being her 14th year training missionaries and teaching three languages.
Settling down at Treeo, a retirement community in Orem, Nancee spends most her time reading the copious amounts of hardback books she has collected over the years. She also does script editing for the man who wrote movies such as Saints and Soldiers and The Work and the Glory. Matt Whitaker. “[she] is my literal pal, my partner in crime," Mr. Whitaker has stated about Nancee. He has also thanked her in many award ceremonies, saying he wouldn’t be there if not for her. She also works for the MTC, this being her 14th year training missionaries and teaching three languages.
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