This Saturday, Sept. 24, friends, family and others who loved Evi Stratton will join Team Hope Walking in the fourth annual Seattle Brain Cancer Walk. The walk is part of a national event to raise awareness about brain cancer and fund research and patient care for those who have been diagnosed with all types of brain cancer.

Last January my mother, Evi Stratton, complained of having headaches and vision problems.

She thought it was a sinus infection, but it just wouldn’t go away. After a seeing an optometrist, who determined nothing was wrong with her eyes, she was referred to a specialist. A scan revealed a 2-centimeter mass on the left side of her brain. Within hours of finding the mass,

Mom was whisked away to brain surgery to remove as much as possible. After the biopsy, she was diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme – a very aggressive brain cancer that is known for swiftly spreading, usually killing the patient within one year of diagnosis. Because of the size and location of my mom’s tumor, she was given three months to live, even with treatment. While we reeled with the news, mom’s stubborn determination kicked in and she simply told the doctor that she had no intention of dying any time soon. Mom believed with all her heart that she could beat it.

For a year, we all thought that she just might.

While she went through chemo and radiation, Mom also became a vegan, took many natural supplements, did acupuncture, drank alkaline water and launched an all-out war on her cancer.

I moved in for a while to care for her and we formed a team determined to learn everything we could about anyone who had ever beat it. There isn’t much out there that is positive, but we kept looking.

Overall, Mom was exceptionally healthy, except that her tumor took away the functionality of the right side of both her eyes. Because of this, she lost many of her freedoms, including horseback riding and reading, her first love. Mom was an avid reader and writer. She wrote five novels, of which four are published under the pen name Evangelynn Stratton. She also wrote children’s stories and songs. When I was a little girl, she would tuck little stories she wrote into my school lunches. She also painted illustrations for these stories, some of which I still have today. Mom once told me that losing her ability to read was the most difficult part of her illness. It frustrated her so much that she even took a black pen to her reading glasses and colored out the right sides, hoping it would enable her to read. While it did help a little, she still always had a stack of things she wanted me to read to her each day.

For the most part, Mom looked and felt great, though she never regained her vision and did have some difficulty speaking. The doctors were proud of her progress and even had trouble finding the tumor site for several months – it looked like it had actually shrunk! Throughout the whole ordeal, mom did her best to keep her fabulous sense of humor. She continued to sing with her church’s praise team and she inspired everyone who knew her.

At the beginning of 2011, while still undergoing the same treatment that had worked so far, mom began to have severe difficulty in communication. She said that she knew what she wanted to say, but just couldn’t seem to get the words to come out. A new scan showed that the tumor had, in fact, reappeared – with a vengeance. These types of tumors are known to “hop” from one site to another, causing all sorts of mental and physical issues as it affects other areas of the brain. The doctors also said that the reason these tumors come back so quickly is that they seem to “figure out” the treatment and work around it.

Mom’s curse was that she was fully aware the entire time, meaning she knew what was happening and that there was nothing she could do. Mom’s final days were like a toboggan ride. She went from being my mom to being disoriented, afraid and childlike. This amazing woman, who had always been so gifted musically, poetically and in so many other creative ways wanted to communicate, but she couldn’t form the words. We could only watch as one day she could walk and the next she was bedridden. Within days of invoking hospice care, my dad, sister and I held her hands as mom slipped away on April 2.

Mom would have been 61 this August. I was grateful to get the chance to honor her on Aug.

18 in a speech that took me all the way to the semifinals of the World Championship of Public Speaking. To see the transcript (and the original blog post upon which the speech was based – including my mom’s comment), visit http://hopespeaking.com and look for “The Snuggie Speech.”

Mom loved the outdoors and we took walks every day that weather permitted right up until her last days. Mom walked with us in the Seattle Brain Cancer Walk last year. This year, she will float above us as we walk in her honor.

Brain cancer does not discriminate. It affects men, women and – yes – children all over the world. According to the National Cancer Institute, 22,340 new cases have been diagnosed and

13,110 have died just this year. Up until recently, very little was known about brain cancer as it was considered very rare. We hope that with awareness and funding from events like the walk, more people will be given a better chance at longer lives after diagnosis.

The fourth annual Seattle Brain Cancer Walk will take place on Saturday, Sept. 24 at

Seattle Center’s Founders Court and 100 percent of the proceeds go to patient care and research. This year, you may stretch your dollars even further as a donor has anonymously offered to match all donations up to $500,000! Please do not miss this chance to offer hope and help to the sufferers and survivors of brain cancer and the families who love them.

To donate and/or join Team Hope Walking, please visit: http://community.swedish.org/.

hopespeaking

Melanie Hope from Kent leads ‘Team Hope’ in memory of her mother | Seattle Brain Cancer Walk