Don, a life of hope; Moffitt, a place of hope
By Mary Harvey, co-chair
I wish that all of the personal stories we bring to you in our newsletters could have happy endings. Unfortunately,
with a disease such as cancer, not all stories end well.
My brother, Don Carey, lost his courageous battle with cancer on March 28 after five long and brutal years. He
didn’t have just one form of the disease but two, each one aggressive and each one deadly. It is unusual for
someone with a dual diagnosis such as Don’s to live as long as he did; it is my firm belief that it was the treatment
and the care he received at Moffitt Cancer Center that gave him those extra few years. He fought the battle with
his whole heart and soul and never gave up until he took his last breath.
I must admit, during the last several months as I watched my brother suffering and in terrible pain, constantly sick
and weakened by the chemo, I wondered many times, “Why are we doing this? Why do we believe a cure is
possible and that any of these new treatments are going to bring an end to this suffering? Why do we put our
loved ones and their families through this agony, only to lose them in the end anyway?”
The answer came to me one night a week before he died, as I sat at his bedside watching him slowly slip away.
Even then, after losing his bladder, a lung and a leg to cancer, he was still asking me if there was a drug trial at
Moffitt that he could participate in. That’s when it struck me: We can never give up or stop believing in a cure
because the patients don’t give up. They are hopeful and they believe in a cure right up until they take their last
breath. They are willing to endure anything—drugs that make them sick for days or weeks on end, treatments that
burn their skin and make their hair fall out, brutal surgeries that leave them without body parts or organs—
anything, just to have the chance to live a little while longer.
I had to ask myself, if these patients can go through all of that and still have hope, how can we not do everything in
our power to support the research that goes into new treatments—treatments that someday will give the person
with a cancer diagnosis the chance to live the full life that we all long for, the life my brother so longed for?
As I look back on this experience and all that has happened, I am truly amazed by where this journey has taken us.
We are a very close family. When something happens to one of us, it happens to all of us. Because of that, we
have spent a lot of time together over these past five years. Much of it has been in the rooms and hallways of
Moffitt Cancer Center.
Over the years those hallways have become a gathering place for my family and for many other families who bond
together over their mutual suffering and fear. It is a place where we have laughed and cried, a place where we
have prayed for and received miracles and it is a place where we have been touched by kindness, compassion
and hope…always hope….
This experience has brought a new depth to our lives and to our relationships with one another. While it is one of
the most difficult things we have endured as a family, it has also brought us closer together and made each of us a
better, more compassionate person.
So, in honor of my brother Don, I will continue to believe that a cure is near and I will keep fighting for the research
to find it. I will tell anyone who will listen about Moffitt Cancer Center and the work they are doing in the fight for the
prevention and cure of cancer.
I will tell them of the kindness and compassion of the nurses and physicians who cared for my brother and all of
the other patients who pass through those doors every day. I will do whatever I can, whenever I can, to advance
this fight. I owe that much to my brother and to all of the patients and families who are struggling with this disease
right now. I owe that much to Moffitt Cancer Center for the extra years they gave my brother and our family.
My hope is that you, too, will get involved, start asking questions, share what you learn with your friends and be
proactive in the fight against this deadly disease. There is an end in sight but there is still so much to be done and
we need your help.