“In July, 2004, when the results of my biopsy
finally came back, I was pretty sure what they
were going to tell me. It was liver cancer. It
was inoperable, and I was going to die.”
James Denbow, 68 years old, of Johnston, Rhode Island, remembers
the first time anyone mentioned a “liver problem” to him. It happened in April 2004 at a
routine visit to his cardiologist.
Denbow is a stroke
survivor, with an irregular heartbeat, but he
had been doing well, he thought, with his
health improving steadily.
Then the doctor said to him, ‘It looks like your
liver is enlarged. You’d
better see your internist
right away.’” From the
internist, to the gastroenterologist,
to the biopsy
at a community hospital, the news had been
uniformly grim. Denbow had a malignancy, a very
large tumor, growing rapidly, and because of
his heart condition, it was essentially untreatable.
As gently as possible, Denbow’s doctors told
him he had four to six months to live. “I was
in pain, yes, but worse, I was in shock. I was
dying. I couldn’t have surgery. I couldn’t have
chemotherapy."
Four to six months: An "accidental" miracle>>
