For Trot intern Rebecca Archdekin, this time of year has developed a whole new meaning. Just four years ago, her grandfather – the man who introduced her to harness racing – was diagnosed with prostate cancer. Today, she’s helping him spread the key message of November’s moustache-flaunting awareness campaign: GET TESTED.
By Rebecca Archdekin
“Thirty dollars saved my life,” he tells me.
It can be hard to imagine your life as a dollar sign – but for Alex Finnie, it’s a simple reality.
Many of my best memories of the time I’ve spent with my grandpa involve harness racing. He took me to my first race when I was very young and soon after my love of horses began to grow. We owned a few standardbreds over the course of my childhood, and I would eagerly clamber into the truck on Sunday mornings with grandpa to head to the barn. Though I spent most of my barn time paying attention to anything other than our horses being jogged, come race night, focus was never an issue. Just the excitement of heading out to Mohawk was almost too much for a kid to handle, and by one minute to post it would hit a whole new level.
Race nights were always great nights, although they were even better when one of our horses was on the track, and there was no greater thrill for me than watching a close race. I always wanted to learn more about harness racing. First it was the difference between a trotter and a pacer, and soon enough I was cramming my young mind with the complex looking (but fairly simple) race program and figuring out how to pick a winning horse. For me, a night at the races was a night well spent with my grandpa, normally ending with me fast asleep before we had even left the busy parking lot. I never imagined that those childhood memories were soon to become even more significant to me.
At 59, my grandpa Alex took a simple blood test known widely as a PSA (prostate-specific antigen test) – a test that looks for early stages of prostate cancer. He had taken the test before, and he knew that a result of Level 4 or higher was a cause for concern. His test showed a 4.6. The result was completely unexpected. My grandpa had developed cancer.
“At first I was in denial and then the shock set in,” he says today of his initial reaction to the diagnosis. “I didn’t know which way to turn. I told my family and I started to do some research.”
His doctor sent him to a specialist where he was reexamined, and it was suggested he go for a biopsy. He did, and a Gleason score of 7 (where anything above 5 is high and 10 is the top of the scale) confirmed the presence of cancer.
His options for action were varied, they told him. They included watchful waiting, surgery, hormone therapy, or nothing at all. He could possibly live 15 years, my grandpa recalls the doctors telling him, if the cancer did not increase in scope or aggression. They sent him home with two weeks to determine how he’d like to proceed.
After weeks of intensive research and a poignant conversation with a neighbour who had recently undergone surgery, he decided to try the surgery himself. The operation itself lasted an hour and a half, and he remained in the hospital for four days; my grandpa follows horse racing on his computer every day, but in the hospital he was disappointed to discover he could not. Soon enough, though, he was back home, and in just a week’s time, he was encouraged to return to light duty at work.
Now, four-and-a-half years after surgery, he is still cancer free. But many men are not as lucky. At 64, my grandpa talks often about living one day at a time, and is speaking out for his cause, spreading awareness and urging that men get tested frequently. “I had been getting tested before my cancer showed up. If you catch it early, you have a higher chance of becoming cancer free and you have more treatment options.
“Look at all those options,” he adds.” If you don’t get it treated it can go after other organs.”
During that brief stay in the hospital, my grandpa came across a cancer support group, which he has now been actively involved with for the last four years; he strongly recommends other afflicted people join a similar community. “You can hear other stories, give newly diagnosed cancer patients the support they need, and learn about all your options.”
Both at home and abroad, the statistics are shocking. The Canadian Cancer Society now claims that one in every two Canadians will develop cancer at some point in their lives (having recently updated that from one in three); every hour of every day, an average of 20 people will be diagnosed with some form of it. Prostate cancer has the highest incident of any cancer in Canadian men (one in seven will be faced with it during their lifetime) and also one of the highest mortality rates.
Over the past few years, Movember – where men grow a moustache for the month of November to raise money and awareness for prostate cancer – has become a global event, and a fundraising fan favourite. Instead of a lottery or an organized event, it’s a fun and unique way to raise awareness and offer funding opportunities to the general public.
A growing trend is for men to sport just basic facial hair for the first two weeks of November. During those first few weeks, they will drum up funds and have donations assigned to a selection of different moustache or ‘Mo’ styles. Whichever style has the most donations by the end of the two weeks is what their moustache will look like for the final weeks of the month! It’s a fun idea that seems to have caught on because it grabs people’s attention over a longer span of time than some more traditional campaigns, and it gets the donors involved in an entertaining way too.
Now an active Movember participant and an advocate for early testing, my grandpa is doing what he can to get the word out about the simplicty of a PSA test and its absolute importance. “You have to take your life into your own hands so you can see your grandchildren grow-up,” he grins.