Barbeque Fund Raiser

From 10/23/05 Desert Sun article.

Barbecue throwing support to 3 families
Fundraiser aims to aid in coping with rare cancer

Karen Pendleton has cancer, and is fighting it with the love and help of her husband, Tom. The two say the amount of support from the community has been tremendous.
Jay Calderon, The Desert Sun

If you go
What: Benefit barbecue and picnic for three area cancer patients and their families.

When: 12:30 p.m. today. Where: Southwest Community Church, 77701 Fred Waring Drive, Indian Wells. Cost: $10 adults, $5 children under 12. A silent auction and raffle will also be held. All proceeds from the event will be split evenly among the three families. Information: 567-4873.

Alison Sachs of Lucy Curci Cancer Center at Eisenhower Medical Center in Rancho Mirage offers the following advice for parents explaining their cancer diagnosis to their children:

Be age appropriate. "Get a good child development book," she said, "to find out what your child will and will not understand."

Be honest and open. "The unknown is much more frightening," Sachs said. "Openly say, 'Daddy's sick, but we've got the best doctors to take care of him, and we're going to love him a lot.'"

Dealing with death. If a child asks, "Is Mommy going to die?" the answer Sachs recommends is: "We don't know, sweetheart, but we're going to do everything we can to make sure that doesn't happen."

Other resources: Kids Konnected is a nonprofit organization based in Laguna Hills that provides education and support for children ages 3-18 with a parent who has cancer. For more information, call 949-582-5443.

K Kaufmann
The Desert Sun

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"Mommy had an owie."

That's what Karen Pendleton of La Quinta told her 4-year-old son earlier this year when she had her first surgery for a rare form of colon cancer and the doctors her insurance plan allowed her to see gave her a five-year prognosis, 10 years tops.

"There was no point in telling him (more)," she said. "He's in a 4-year-old world. He's concerned about playing."

Pendleton is about to have a second "owie," an aggressive and expensive treatment not covered by her insurance that she and husband, Tom, hope will give the 39-year-old mom and aerobics instructor a better chance at seeing their two sons, 4 and 7 years old, grow up.

Fundraiser today

The couple will travel to Washington, D.C., for the operation in early November. Today, Karen Pendleton, two other cancer patients and their families will be treated to a community barbecue to help raise funds for treatment.

The event runs from 12:30 to 3 p.m. at Southwest Community Church, 77701 Fred Waring Drive, Indian Wells.

The outpouring of community support for the Pendletons and other families involved in the fundraiser highlights what Alison Sachs, counseling coordinator at Eisenhower Lucy Curci Cancer Center in Rancho Mirage, sees as an increasingly common phenomenon.

More adult cancer patients are being diagnosed at earlier ages, she said, and they often have spouses and young children.

"Cancer is not a diagnosis of an individual," she said. "It is a diagnosis of the family."

Sachs did not have exact figures on cancer cases in the Coachella Valley, but nationwide figures from the American Cancer Society show that the probability of an invasive cancer diagnosis for Americans 39 and younger is about 1 in 60. For those older than 40, the probability of a cancer diagnosis jumps to about 1 in 12.

And in many cases, a parent fighting cancer must also contend with extraordinary financial and emotional pressures.

Paying it forward

Skip Osgood of La Quinta, the man behind the fundraiser, was 41 and the father of three girls when he was diagnosed with a brain tumor two years ago.

The family took a hit financially because Osgood, who sells real estate, was unable work, and their two oldest daughters, who had been home-schooled, were sent to public schools for a year.

"Our middle child was 6 then," he recalled. "We had moved, (and) she wanted to go back to our other house because everything had been OK at that house. She got very adamant."

The 6-year-old settled in over time as he and his wife, Linda, adopted a policy of telling the kids "everything," Osgood said.

But he said: "We had to guard our reactions. What I wanted to impart (is that) bad things are going to happen in your life; what matters is what you do about it."

In fact, Osgood was inspired to organize today's event by a similar fundraiser friends held for him last year. Learning to accept help has been another challenge, he said.

"When (people) find out you've got a sickness, they always say, 'Is there anything I can do,'" he said. "We're conditioned to say, 'No, everything's OK.'"

Ric Letzerich of La Quinta, another of the barbecue beneficiaries, did not have health insurance when he was diagnosed with lymphatic cancer at the end of June. The self-employed house painter, 51, and his wife, Kelly, also self-employed, had never felt they could afford it.

Premiums would have been $1,000 to $1,200 per month, he said. "We needed that kind of money," he said.

And even after his diagnosis, he said, he did not qualify for state-funded insurance under Medi-Cal. He and Kelly quickly depleted their savings, but he said help has "come out of the woodwork."

Most of his treatment costs have been paid by a special "scholarship" from the Comprehensive Cancer Center in Palm Springs, he said, and checks continue to come in from friends and family - he has three adult sons from a previous marriage.

Cancer center staffers were not available for comment.

Letzerich said that when Osgood first contacted him about the fundraiser, he was hesitant about accepting more help.

"You're kind of humbled," he said, "but there's a need."

The third family receiving funds from the event has asked to remain anonymous. Osgood and the three other families are all members of Southwest Community Church, but the church is not sponsoring the fundraiser.

Karen and Tom Pendleton say the offers of help they've received continue to overwhelm them. The couple has a Blue Cross plan through Tom's job with an area construction firm, but because her cancer is so rare - the medical term for it is appendiceal adenocarcinoma - the plan does not cover the $35,000 operation she will have on Nov. 10.

Her parents are coming to stay with her sons, and the 7-year-old is worried about the two to three weeks she will be away.

Pendleton has told him she has cancer, but she said, "He doesn't know people die from it. We try to keep it simple and positive."