 | | | Nathan with the "end of treatment" trophy from his oncologist (Photos courtesy of the Walz family) | |
Help from the Benedictines
St. John’s Preparatory School in Collegeville, Minnesota, is run by the Benedictine monks of St. John’s Abbey. “Life together in this place,” reads part of the school’s mission statement, “is built on trust, love, respect, and a genuine interest and concern for one another.” To learn more about the school, visit sjprep.net or call 800-525-PREP. To find out more about the abbey, visit saintjohnsabbey.org or call 320-363-2011.
Nathan's determination
In September 2007, Nathan was diagnosed with avascular necrosis, a bone disease resulting from the steroids Nathan was given during his cancer treatment. The condition is causing deterioration in Nathan’s thigh bones and may affect his knee joints. Through swimming, weight training, and other exercise, Nathan is building up strength to try and stop the progress of the disease in order to play baseball again this year. |
Nathan was running, the dirt-stained football in his grip, when he felt the force of his brother’s weight thrown on him in a tackle. Nathan fell to the ground, laughing. His brother Brian might be 12, but he was quick. Nathan, 15, opened his mouth to speak, but was overtaken by a cough. Another followed.
“Hold on, bro,” he managed.
The game paused as the two brothers sat on the grass, their breath making little white clouds in the chill November air. Football season must really have worn me out, Nathan thought. He gazed past the sturdy oak tree in the front lawn of their farm outside Cold Springs to the fields where, that summer, row upon row of golden corn had stood tall in the sunlight. Nathan tugged at his Minnesota Twins sweatshirt. He suddenly felt so tired.
“C’mon, boys,” called their dad from the front door. “That’s enough football for today. Nathan, we’re taking you to the doctor’s. I can hear you coughing from inside. I don’t want you getting pneumonia.”
The ICU room was quiet after the doctors left. Nathan’s parents, like grieving sentinels, sat clutching his hands on either side of the hospital bed. Nathan stared at the opposite wall, his mind struggling to catch up with reality. Only a few days ago he had been playing football with his brother.Now he was lying in a hospital bed after biopsy surgery, trying to grasp what he had just been told. His hand slid to his chest. Beneath his palm, growing insidiously inside him, was a cancerous tumor the size of a cantaloupe. Non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. He would need two years of chemotherapy to fight it.
I have cancer, Nathan thought slowly, as though breaking the news to himself. He saw everything from his old life — school, band, all the sports he played — slipping away.
When the family eventually drove home, Nathan stared out the window at a world that seemed sinister and strange. Buildings stood cold and indifferent against a bleak, gray sky. People hurried forward against a brisk November wind, their faces shrouded in scarves and mufflers. It seemed to Nathan as though it were he, and not the coldness of the wind, that the passersby were trying to avoid. As they pulled up to the house, Nathan stared across at the cornfields. Th e stalks were brittle stumps, the ground frosty and cold.
God, he prayed, are you there? What’s going to happen to me?April afternoon sunshine streamed through the living room window and onto the futon where Nathan had dozed while doing homework. He awoke to find Riley, his new terrier, licking his face. Nathan was feeling awful that day, but the sight of Riley’s small, fuzzy white face made him laugh.
“Getting that dog was a good idea, I guess,” his mother said, grinning.
Nathan ruffled Riley’s white coat. “He’s so funny,” he said. “He’s this foot-tall terrier, but he thinks he’s a Doberman.”
“He’s got a fighting spirit,” his mom said. “Like someone else I know.”
Nathan rolled his eyes, but smiled. “Touché, Mom.”
