Black Point – Mary-Jo MacLeod isn’t a person that slows down much. But when she felt sapped of energy and began losing weight rapidly, she knew it was time to make a trip to the doctor.
“I’ve got the energy of 10 people, but I was just so exhausted,” she recalls. “I knew something was wrong. I figured he’d tell me I was run down or needed some vitamins or something.”
It’s been nearly five years since she sat in a doctor’s office on a blustery December day and heard the words that changed her life: “You have cancer.”
Specifically, MacLeod was diagnosed with Chronic Melanoma Leukemia. It’s what she dubs the “good” kind of “uglies” – it’s curable – but it still meant a long road ahead of her.
MacLeod was just 42 years old, a mother of five boys ranging in age from 25 to five, and step-mother to another teenager.
“My youngest, Keegan, just went to school that fall,” she remembers. “And there I was, lots of decisions needed to be made, lots of tears. I was just swept right off my feet.”
Almost worse than those decisions was the knowledge that she’d have to tell her children, Matthew, Tim, Sandy, Chase, Josh and Keegan, that she was sick. With husband Derwin Bowden – who she says was her guardian angel throughout the ordeal – she broke the news to them.
“It was so hard. You want to protect them, even the 25-year-old, because you’re their mom,” she said, her voice breaking. “I think their biggest fear was losing me. They kept saying, “we just want you to get better, mom, do whatever you have to do.” There were a lot of tears, a lot of emotions. But we stayed anchored together. They talked to each other, talked to my sister.”
Although she never worried her children would be safe, her diagnosis left her to imagine a world for them without her in it.
“I worried about not being there to help them or be there to do whatever they needed a mom to do, whether it was making a pan of chocolate chip cookies or to give them a hug or even just saying I love you,” she said.
She went home that night with the first in a series of pills she’d have to take, a powerful form of chemo medication that also comes with a heavy price tag, $3,600 a month for just one pill a day. The goal was simple – to see if the meds would put her into remission.
And it did, at first. For four months, she took the medication and it seemed to be helping. But five years ago this month, she discovered the pills had attacked her liver, and it was time to make another decision – to try another pill, or to have a transplant.
During that time, MacLeod’s family rallied around her. Her sister, Joyce Richard, took over being mom to MacLeod’s kids and did whatever was needed, and along with her brothers, Danny and Brian MacLeod, her siblings were all tested to see if they were a match for a bone marrow transplant.
MacLeod was fortunate. Her younger brother Brian was a perfect match.
“I was so lucky. He was a 100 per cent perfect match, and he was ready and willing to go to Halifax whenever the time was there.”
That time came in late May 2006. First on an outpatient basis, she went through five days of the strongest chemo there is, then she was admitted for two days of IV chemo. She was given a day of rest, and on June 1, doctors transplanted Brian’s bone marrow stem cells into MacLeod’s body.
MacLeod spent 18 days in isolation, Bowden spending the whole time by her side, before she was released to a nearby apartment secured by the Cancer Society for her use because she was so far from home.
But she wasn’t free of doctors yet – she had daily appointments, starting at 8 a.m. and lasting until 4 p.m., for the next six months. It was only then that she could return to her Black Point home.
The house was empty when MacLeod and Bowden drove up, except for the family dog Goof, who was ecstatic to see her.
“They came after…I think they were scared to come,” she said.
It wasn’t long before she started appearing at judo meetings, basketball games and hockey tournaments to support her kids, doing whatever she could to be the mom they needed while still recovering. Her son Sandy and his then-girlfriend, Meghan, had just had her first grandson, Xander, giving her one more reason to get better.
“It was very important for me to see that baby grow up,” she said. “I tried to keep a positive attitude – you have to, it helps you if you stay as positive as you can.”
MacLeod’s story doesn’t end there, however. When she was sick, she was forced to retire from her job, and still isn’t well enough to work today. One of the complications she had from the chemo was three months of blindness, which she’s happily recovered from, but she still has many health problems today.
“It’s hard. Once you start feeling a little better, people think you’re better. There’s no realization that you’re still really sick. They think once you’re transplant is done, you’ll be better and back to work in three months. I’m still not back today. It’s been a long road, some ups, some downs, a lot of tears and other complications, but I’ve gotten through.”
Keegan, she says, has been an angel, and still does whatever she needs to help her today.
“There’s nothing Keegan didn’t help me do. He was just a little boy, just a baby, and whatever I needed he did. He still does, it’s pretty amazing. This 10-year-old boy and my spouse, Derwin, are pretty close to God in my mind.”
Even though five years have passed since her diagnosis, MacLeod wanted to tell her story now to encourage others facing the same challenges.
“Every year, when cancer awareness month comes, I sit there and I read the story,” she said. “This is my way of thanking everyone – my family, my friends, the Judo club who were there with whatever I needed, my doctors and nurses, the community. And I wanted people out there to know who they are and how grateful and thankful I am that they were there through all of this.”
