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Cancer survivors share their stories during Breakfast for Champions

Cancer is 'no longer a definite death sentence,' survivor, run organizer says; Terry Fox Week underway in Orillia

There’s a reason people liken cancer to a battle.

Many stricken with the disease are fighting for their lives against an intruder, with a support system of family and friends at their side and radiation treatment attacking cancer cells from within.

It’s a battle, all right, and it’s a special moment when people emerge as champions.

It’s fitting, then, that local cancer survivors were treated to the annual Breakfast for Champions on Monday at Bayside Restaurant in Orillia.

“It’s just acknowledging what people have been through. Chemo and radiation are not fun,” said Heather Bazinet.

A nurse for 28 years, Bazinet was familiar with the effects cancer could have on patients.

“I had given a cancer patient their last shot of morphine before they died,” she said.

Then, she became the patient when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. When she was told she’d have to undergo 18 months of chemotherapy, she felt numb.

“That’s a hell of a long time,” she said. “I didn’t hear anything else the doctor said.”

Her family, her treatment and her sense of humour helped her through the ordeal, and she has been cancer-free for more than three years.

“Even though I’m in the clear, it’s in my system,” she said. “Will it pop up again?”

It’s a question on the minds of many who have been given the “all-clear,” and it’s why events like the upcoming Orillia Terry Fox Run are so important to survivors and those still fighting cancer. All of the money raised goes toward cancer research.

Roberta Ewing will be taking part in Sunday’s event at Couchiching Beach Park.

“It’s something that’s affected my family and I want to kick its butt,” said Ewing, who has been free of uterine cancer for four years.

Like Bazinet, Ewing thought the worst. Her mother died of kidney cancer at a relatively young age.

“That’s what went through my mind when they told me,” she said.

She had taken part in fundraising walks before her own diagnosis, but it took on a new meaning after she got the news. So, she and her cat, Mr. Paws, will join others Sunday as they continue to raise awareness and money.

Joanne Sine will be there, too.

Sine’s breast cancer diagnosis “was a real shock,” she said, because she had done the self-checking and hadn’t found anything. A routine mammogram did.

“I didn’t want to talk about it,” said Sine, who has been cancer-free for 13 years. “It wasn't until I started talking to others (with cancer) that I realized there are other people out there.”

“I think Terry Fox had a big part in bringing it out into the open,” added Alison Stoneman, organizer of the Orillia Terry Fox Run.

Fox’s Marathon of Hope in 1980 pretty much demanded it be talked about openly, that it become a national conversation.

Survivors, known as Terry’s Team, gather every year at the start of the Orillia run to acknowledge supporters, to be acknowledged and to serve as proof that cancer research makes a difference.

“People are living,” said Stoneman, also a cancer survivor. “It’s no longer a definite death sentence.”

Monday’s Breakfast for Champions — with the meal donated by Bayside Restaurant — was the first Orillia Terry Fox Week event. It was followed by a flag raising at the Orillia Opera House.

On Wednesday, a trivia night will be held at Kelsey’s, starting at 7 p.m. Cost is $15 per person, with all proceeds going toward cancer research.

The Terry Fox Run will cap the week Sunday.

For information about how to get involved or to support someone who is taking part, click here.


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Nathan Taylor

About the Author: Nathan Taylor

Nathan Taylor is the desk editor for Village Media's central Ontario news desk in Simcoe County and Newmarket.
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