On March 10, 2013, it was all over. “The next morning when I got up, my mouth tasted like a dumpster. I didn’t want to know anything about nicotine for the rest of my life, honest to God.”
It was 2005, and 47-year-old Rick Crowley had a lump growing in his neck. The first biopsy indicated that it was benign, but his doctors in Olean, New York, were not convinced. A good thing, too: The second biopsy found cancer.
I tried to ignore the pain and the feeling of being “off.” But one day, after struggling through a few minutes of yet another bad run, I stopped in mid-stride, pulled out my phone, and called my doctor.
A survivor of Hodgkin’s lymphoma that was discovered when she was 16, Caryn Domzalski, now 35, has stayed active in Roswell Park’s Adolescent and Young Adult Program. Through them, she heard about Roswell Park’s Oncofertility Clinic.
Wigs, it turns out, aren’t ready-to-wear right off the shelf. They come with lots of extra hair that needs to be thinned, trimmed and sometimes layered. That’s where professional hairstylists Jeff Lindner and LaFondra Martin come in.
Once a month, Kathy Halliday of Snyder, N.Y. comes to Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center laden with armfuls of donations, items she made with her own two hands, to be given to patients in need of warmth or spiritual comfort.