my friends," Ashley said, opening her eyes again. "I don't
know about my classes. Well, I miss some of my classes. But I miss all
of my teachers and my friends."
For the past few weeks, Ashley has been
home from school where she is undergoing a new type of chemotherapy treatment.
Every day she takes two different types of medicine, administered in pill
form -- VP16 and thalidomide.
"It really wipes her out and makes
her nauseous," Paul said. "But her teachers have been great.
I can't say enough good things about WISD and all the teachers at the
high school. They've been sending her work home so she can stay caught
up on her studies, and we're working to get her into the district's homebound
program that will allow her to keep up with her class and allow her to
return to school when she starts feeling better."
In the O'Rear household, the key word is
"when," not if.
"Ashley is a fighter," Susan stressed,
the determination heard in her voice.
"We're going to beat this. As long
as she wants to fight, I'm there fighting with her. We're not going to
let this stupid cancer take control," Susan said.
The day the phone call came from the doctor,
Paul and Susan sat Ashley down and broke the news.
"She didn't flinch," Susan said.
"She just looked up at us and asked,
'That's not good, huh?'" Paul said. "Then her next response
was, 'Does this mean I
But Susan had begun to notice that Ashley was having trouble keeping her balance, and she was beginning to slur her words again -- symptoms the O'Rear family had seen before.
"Susan was talking with one of the doctors at Children's Medical Center about it, and although all of her tests up until then had come back negative, he said we should bring her in for a CT scan," Paul said.
That was Sept. 11 -- a day Paul said was tragic in many ways.
"The CT scan came back inconclusive, but the doctor was concerned enough to order an MRI. They got us in around 5 that afternoon, but the radiologist had already left for the day and we were told he would call us with the results in the morning.
"I wasn't really worried," Paul said. "I was convinced she had beaten cancer."
For Susan, however, it was a sleepless night of worry.
In the back of my mind, I
"Paul took it a lot harder than I did I think, in large part because I had prepared myself for the call. She's my best friend," Susan said, reaching down and taking Ashley's hand in hers, evoking a smile from her daughter. "I knew."
When the phone rang Sept. 12, Paul was the one who received the news.
"The doctor told me that she has an inoperable tumor in her head," Paul said, explaining that because of previous radiation treatments, doctors felt Ashley wouldn't be a good candidate for that option.
"Hearing it for the second time is actually harder than the first," Susan said, looking down at Ashley who had cuddled up in her lap. "It was hard to hear. It's still hard to hear. I don't want to see her go through the pain and suffering and miss out on her school and friends."
"I do miss my teachers and