Jun 03
SIX…WHOLE…YEARS
That’s how long it’s been since Dr. Marc Hirsh, my dear friend, oncologist and former boss, was diagnosed with a rare, stage 4, incurable neuroendocrine tumor of thymic origin. 
Neither the specialists nor Marc expected him to last six weeks, let alone six months…and certainly not six years.
On May 22, 2020, Marc went to the ER with severe chest pain and great difficulty breathing. Imaging showed a 12 cm tumor in the center of his chest had invaded his heart and collapsed one lung. The next day after seeing the reports, Marc instructed his employees to start closing his 31-year-old oncology practice. The next month he devised his own protocol of radiation/hormone therapy/oral chemo and began his healing journey.
Regular follow-ups have miraculously shown the tumor to be smaller (less than 6 cm) and stable.
Last month Marc turned 75 and this week he and Elizabeth celebrated their 46th wedding anniversary. In these past six years, they’ve welcomed two adopted granddaughters, traveled tens of thousands of miles in their RV, and allowed a new dog–a 90-pound golden retriever named Boondock–to steal their hearts.
“I feel like the past six years, in some ways, are the most enjoyable of my life,” Marc says. “I loved being an oncologist, but it was hard work and stressful being in solo practice.”
And while he misses his patients, Marc (an accomplished, multi-instrument musician with a great Bob Dylan voice) really enjoys the extra time he has to relearn classical music, as well as play old favorite Messianic Jewish worship melodies. He’s even taught his only grandson to play the saxophone and describes him as “quite talented.” And after not having enough lung power to play his own sax for the first few years after the diagnosis, Marc once again has picked up his “baby” alto saxophone.
“I still get short of breath and a little light-headed if I forget to stop playing soon enough,” he says with a laugh, “but I’m enjoying it again.
“I’m living like I don’t have cancer,” he adds. “Psychologically, I feel like I’m cured and just slowing down because I’m getting older.”
20th anniversary
When I asked Marc what he’s grateful for in these “extra” six years, he quickly answered: “Definitely more time with Elizabeth, our (two) children and (five) grandchildren…and having time to do things outside of medicine.”
In 2023 another challenge appeared as Elizabeth was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease. Her left side is greatly affected and she needs Marc’s assistance with the tasks she no longer can perform by herself. Prescription medicine has helped with some of Elizabeth’s symptoms and she is managing to push through the unpleasant side effects.
At his 5-year “cancerversary” milestone, Marc told me: “I’m incredibly grateful to God that He allowed me to be here for Elizabeth after all she’s done for me.”
When I first blogged about Marc’s diagnosis, I never imagined I would give semi-annual updates for six years. Now that he is finished with check-ups at Hershey Medical and will be followed by local physicians instead, there won’t be any more “updates” from me. Think of it as “no news is good news.”
Marc describes his life-shattering diagnosis as now feeling like a “distant nightmare,” adding “I barely remember it and feel like I’ve totally moved beyond it.” 
“I think the thing I’m really grateful about is that I just feel a lot more peaceful, much less anger and frustration with other people,” he explains. “I wouldn’t say I feel closer to God, but it’s more of a peaceful relationship.”
To which I say, thank You, Jesus, for six…whole…years.
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Please open in your browser to hear Rich Mullins, Marc and Elizabeth’s favorite Christian artist, sing “You’re My One Thing.” Songwriters: Rich Mullins © 1989 Edward Grant Inc.
May 20
Our extended family of 14 (seven adults and seven kids) always spends a fun-filled vacation week together and this year we’ll be heading back to a lakeside home in the Poconos Mountains (a.k.a. foothills). I think most of us are counting the days until we can relax, refresh, renew…and catch more fish with Grandpa!
Ever feel like you need a vacation from whatever health trial you and your family are facing?
You probably do (or you know someone who does)—at least a mental one, if not a physical respite as well.
Believe it or not the chemo room at Dr. Marc Hirsh’s office, where I worked as a patient advocate for nearly 20 years, became a mini-vacation from illness for patients when we threw elaborate parties for two days near Halloween.
One year it was a Sesame Street theme and I obliged as Miss Piggy. (For the record, I “porked up” with eight pairs of rolled up socks under my skirt and down my blouse!)
Another year we dressed up as Wizard of Oz characters with good and bad witches giving chemo. I covered my whole yellow-clad body with a long piece of yellow shelf paper. 
“Follow the yellow brick road!” I announced in my best Munchkin voice as I led patients back to the treatment room.
You’ve probably heard of the non-profit organization Make-a-Wish which grants wishes for children facing a life-threatening illness—often a trip to Disney World or a chance to meet a famous athlete or movie star, but there also are programs for adults.
If you search “free wish-granting for adult patients” a slew of them come up. This list will get you started on vacays for all kinds of serious illnesseshttps://cancercarenews.com/more-cancer-freebies/wishes/ But don’t make the mistake I did once by searching for “adult wishes” as that’s an entirely different category!
My friend Barb Titanish and her wonderful H.O.P.E. ministry, have created a beautiful farmhouse retreat in south-central Pennsylvania where folks can have a vacation from cancer. The 18-acre site has a beautiful farmhouse, a swimming pool, peaceful walking trails, a tranquility garden and a fire pit . Folks can come for three to five days. https://hopelifeline.org/application-for-haven/
“Whether you are just diagnosed, starting a new treatment or at the end of life, you need to give yourself a break,” says Barb.
You also can create a mini-vacation from illness right in your own home. Declare every first Friday of the month to be “Cancer-Free Friday” where you only watch funny movies and no one is allowed to mention the “C” word. Or plan an outing for the day—a backroads ride with a picnic or an ice cream stop. Perhaps a mani-pedi and a tea room. Or maybe an afternoon hitting golf balls and eating BBQ.
Ask yourself, what would help your mind/body/spirit to take a vacation from whatever you’re facing? Pray about it and ask God how you or someone you know can make it happen. People cannot read your mind so let those who have asked to help you know what you really need. You deserve a break today…and I’m not thinking McDonald’s.
When they walk through the Valley of Weeping, it will become a place of refreshing springs.
The autumn rains will clothe it with blessings. Psalm 84:6
Adapted from Peace in the Face of Cancer ©2017 by Lynn Eib
P.S. I’d love for you to leave a comment about vacation plans you have for any kind of R&R this summer!)
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Open in your browser to hear Refresh Me by Leeland
May 06
For me, May is a month full of mournful memories. Of difficult prayers not answered the way I had hoped.
Mom & Dad 50th anniversary 2002
I’m willing to bet you have some months, holidays or seasons which remind you of prayers not answered the way you hoped.
Why, God, did I even get pregnant if the baby was never going to be born? Why couldn’t this have happened on another day besides Mother’s Day?
Why, Lord, did my Dad have to be without his family by his side? Why couldn’t he live four more hours until Mom arrived?
Why, God, couldn’t my mom’s infection have been found sooner and treated? Why couldn’t she have lived a little longer and held two precious great-grandchildren?
I’m sure you have your own “whys.”
Why this diagnosis? Why this financial struggle? Why this job loss? Why this grief?
I can honestly say that even though God didn’t give me any real answers to my questions, He did meet me in the pain.
Alone in my hospital room following the miscarriage and D&C surgery, I finally was able to cry. People telling me that I was young and would have other children had not soothed my grief.
1977 pregnant with Danielle
Don’t they realize I want the child I carried inside me for three months and already loved?
So in my despair that no one seemed to understand, I told God I needed to hear from Him.
I randomly flipped open my Bible and touched the right-hand page. (I do not normally recommend the “flip-and-point” method of scripture reading!)
My eyes fell on James 1:2-4:
Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.
Reading those verses that Mother’s Day brought me a peace unlike any other time I’ve ever read them. I was still grieving my circumstances, but I knew the God of the Universe had heard my cries and was at work in my life. I could endure in His strength.
When my mother was in her last days resting peacefully in her own bed, I put a CD player on the headboard and a stack of CDs next to it—a mix of music she loved: barbershop 4-part harmony, instrumental jazz and worship tunes. I encouraged the caregivers to choose and a play a CD.
When she passed away, I walked into the room and fell to my knees sobbing by her bedside. I can honestly say it was the deepest sorrow I have known. And then I heard it:
The CD playing an old a cappella version of “In Christ Alone”–one of the songs I want at my funeral.
“My source of strength,
My source of hope
Is Christ alone.”
I had not put in that CD and honestly didn’t remember the song was on one of the discs.
But God “remembered.” He knows how much that song means to me and He supernaturally arranged to have it playing as He welcomed Mom Home.
So, my weary friend, take all your questions to your heavenly Father and then “fall in the arms of the only One Who knows the reason for every hard season.”
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Please open in your browser to hear the encouraging song Hard Season by Matthew West.
Apr 22
I treasure this depiction of “God” drawn decades ago by my youngest daughter Lindsey. Don’t you love God’s cape? Obviously a superhero to her not-quite 6-year-old eyes. 
So I’m wondering what did God look like to you when you were a child? Has your mental picture stayed pretty much the same or has it changed?
I think most of us probably have some inaccurate views of God–images not taught in scripture, but impressed upon us by songs, movies or our upbringing. Contrary to that beautiful Bette Midler melody, God is not watching us from a distance. And while Garth Brooks is correct that “some of God’s greatest gifts are unanswered prayers,” we are not just talking to “the man upstairs.”
Twentieth-century American author/pastor A. W. Tozer made an amazing statement about how we view God:
Wow! The most important thing about you and me is not our jobs, education, money, looks or even our families. Instead the very most important thing about us is what we think about God–who He is, how He acts, what He can and cannot do.
In fact, our view of God shapes our attitudes, our emotions, our responses, and our plans in unimaginable ways.
So do you think of God as “the man upstairs” who’s nearby and helps out if we need a hand? Or is He the Creator who laid the foundations of the earth (Job 38:4) and whose power and presence cannot be contained in a building or a universe (2 Chronicles 2:6)?
Is He like Santa Claus making a list of who’s naughty and nice? Or is He the God of grace, giving us what we don’t deserve and of mercy, not giving us what we do deserve (John 1:16, Ephesians 2:4)?
Is the God in your mind a strict dictator only looking out for Himself? Or is He the always good Father who
“loved the world so much that He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life” (John 3:16)?
Is your image of God one of a magic genie who grants our wishes if we utter the right prayer or say the perfect number of Hail Marys? Or is He the holy Almighty “beyond our reach and exalted in power” (Job 37:23) and for whom “nothing is impossible” (Luke 1:37)?
Ponder your situation or your loved one’s and ask yourself: What am I thinking about God in relation to this trial…this diagnosis…this struggle…this fear…this disappointment…this loss?
Is your image of Him found in the Bible or has it been pieced together from some less reliable sources?
I love author Ann Spangler’s description of God: “With no failings or flaws, He is better than the best person you have ever met or read about. Because God is entirely good, there is never any room for improvement, never any need for change. Everything about Him–His thoughts, motives, intentions, plans, words, commands, decisions, and actions–is good.”
The LORD, the God of compassion and mercy!
I am slow to anger and filled with unfailing love and faithfulness.
—God speaking to Moses, Exodus 34:6
If that is what comes to mind when we think about God, it will change the way we face the trials of life.
Dear friend, no matter what happens–or doesn’t happen–to you or your loved one, I promise you that no one has ever, or will ever, love you as much as our good, good Heavenly Father does.
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Open in your browser to hear “Good Good Father” by Chris Tomlin ℗ 2015 sixstepsrecords LLC and Capitol CMG, Inc.
Apr 08
A few weeks ago I taught a Sunday School lesson for second- through sixth-graders which left most of the class gagging, spitting into napkins and begging for water.
My granddaughter tasting “wet dog!”
It was one of my all-time favorite lessons.
Lest you think I’ve totally lost my mind, here’s what happened.
I explained to the dozen kids gathered that I wanted to play a game which I was calling “Good Decision/Bad Decision.” Participation was entirely voluntary.
I think all of them were familiar with Bean Boozled jelly beans, but for any of you “uninformed,” there are two “flavors” for each color of jelly bean. You have to decide which one you will eat. A tan bean with brown spots could either be toasted marshmallow or stinkbug. A red and white one: pomegranate or old bandage. And an orange bean: peach or barf!
I didn’t want any kids to actually “barf,” so I had napkins to spit out yucky beans, small cups with water to rinse out mouths, and delicious gumdrops to remove any lingering aftertaste.
I was surprised that every single student wanted to play and most wanted multiple turns! A few “good” decisions were made, but there were definitely plenty of “bad” too. (I ran out of napkins and most of my gumdrops. Here’s a 12-second video of some of the action https://youtu.be/P5mYYOFupgo )
Afterwards we talked about how to make good decisions and avoid bad ones, while recognizing that Bean Boozled candy didn’t actually give you any way to consistently make a good choice.
That lesson got me thinking about negative, life-altering events about which we don’t get a choice. Like when I was smacked by a colon cancer diagnosis in 1990 at age 36 when I was pretty much a health nut. I was perplexed and confounded this could happen to me and felt as if I had been fooled and cheated into thinking that living a healthy lifestyle would protect me. (By the way, all those italicized words are definitions of bamboozled!)
I got handed a stinkbug jelly bean instead of the toasted marshmallow one I expected.
How about you? Anything turning out in your life not the way you planned? Perhaps something unfair or even unimaginable? Maybe a health diagnosis for you or a loved one which resembles “stinky socks” much more than “tutti-frutti?”
So much of the discouragement I’m feeling about this world right now stems from people’s decisions which adversely affect me and especially others I care about–leaving a “bad” taste in my mouth. So what can I do? Spit in a napkin? Drink water? Eat a gumdrop?
I wish it were that easy.
Instead, I remind myself that when life feels out-of-control, there is one thing I always can control: me.
“The longer I live, the more convinced I am that life is 10 percent what happens to us and 90 percent how we respond to it,” writes pastor-author Chuck Swindoll. “I believe the single most significant decision I can make on a day-to-day basis is my choice of attitude.”
So these are the verses I’m trusting the Holy Spirit to use for my “attitude adjustment:”
Listen, open your ears, harness your desire to speak,
and don’t get worked up into a rage so easily, my brothers and sisters. James 1:19 The Voice Bible
Since God chose you to be the holy people He loves,
you must clothe yourselves with tenderhearted mercy,
kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. Colossians 3:12
I agree with Pastor Swindoll that “When my attitudes are right, there’s no barrier too high, no valley too deep, no dream too extreme, no challenge too great for me.”
And I remind myself that as Mack Brock sings: “My God is still in control…You have not left me alone, though the world has let me down.”
(Open in your browser to hear.)
I’m a newspaper reporter-turned-author. And I’m a passionate encourager, but always a truth-teller. I worked for nearly two decades in a unique position as a patient advocate in my oncologist’s office and the Cancer Prayer Support Group I founded in 1991 is the country’s oldest such faith-based group.
