Doctor gives Moore the bad news

By Shavonne Potts

spotts@salisburypost.com

Deena Moore awoke in the hospital, missing three days of her life. The last thing she remembered was being rushed to the hospital by her sister, Martha. Moore, who rarely had headaches, was having a major one.

“Out of the corner of my eye I was seeing tiny flashing red, green and blue lights,” she said.

The doctor told Moore she had a malignant brain tumor, a glioblastoma. She was rushed into surgery to remove the tumor, which was rapidly growing, from the base of the right side of her brain.

“The surgery lasted a couple of hours,” she said from her home.

When she went into the operating room, she looked for a clock to time the surgery, but on the way out she had problems focusing her eyes and couldn’t make out the numbers on the clock. She just knew the surgery was a couple of hours.

The surgeon told Moore he got all of the tumor and then some. He even removed the edges that typically generate regrowth. She had chemotherapy and radiation.

Just four weeks later, the tumor grew back. Prior to surgery the tumor was near her spinal cord and when it began growing back it was growing from the left part of her brain to the right.

Moore can’t do more radiation because she’s had the maximum allowed and doesn’t want more surgery.

“I do not want anybody probing around in my brain. I don’t want to go through that,” she said.

Quality of life is important to Moore. The doctor discussed a different type of chemotherapy that would require her to receive it every two weeks that could prolong her life. The doctor also recommended hospice care. She chose not to go that route.

She hasn’t been in any pain, just some discomfort since the surgery. She takes steroids that are used to decrease the swelling of her brain, but it also makes her face and body swell.

Moore relies on her faith and humor to sustain her.

She attends Grace United Methodist Church, where she used to work as the secretary before being diagnosed.

“They have been so wonderful,” she said of her church family.

Her sister has been a tremendous help.

“Martha has been a rock. She’s been keeping me straight,” she said.

Sometimes friends and neighbors pitch in. She’s come home some days and her grass is mowed, flowers or food on the back porch.

“These are the little things that help. It’s the physical sentiments that mean a lot,” she said.

Moore sends her friends and family e-mail updates about how she’s doing. She writes about her doctor’s appointments and how she’s feeling. In the 200 or more e-mails, she mixes humor with her updates, like when she describes the “hoof print” in the back of her head. The print is the surgery scar and is in the shape of a hoof print. Or she makes jokes about giving up her break-dancing classes following surgery.

“She’s always been funny,” Martha said.

“I get it from my mother,” Moore said.

Moore told her oncologist Dr. Mark Wimmer that she felt so bad for him having to tell people time-after-time they have cancer and are going to die. She admits it was a day she was feeling quite emotional. Moore said she felt sorry for Wimmer. The doctor told her he felt bad having to tell her the cancer was terminal.

“I only have to hear it once,” she said laughing.

She has her moments, but she’s content with the way things are.

“I’ve had a full plate to my life, maybe not the buffet I wanted,” she said. “I’m comfortable spiritually and emotionally.”

She believes this is a fate God trusted her to bear.

“He trusted me so I trust him,” Moore said.