This story was written by Kim, Mitch’s sister. Mitch and Kim’s family has a long background of cancer ncluding their grandmother and mother both having breast cancer, and a paternal aunt that had breast cancer. Furthermore, Kim herself is a breast cancer survivor. She, with Mitch’s permission, asked that e share his story.

First of all, his name is Mitch Kelley and he is a 39 year old divorced father of a 12 year old daughter named Kennedy. On February 17, 2007 my cousin walked out of their place of employment and found Mitch lying on the ground unconscious with the left side of his head and face completely covered in blood. He thought he had been mugged. He called 911 and while on the way to the hospital, Mitch had a seizure. After several days of scans and MRIs, it was determined that Mitch had had a seizure and that's what caused him to pass out in the parking lot. They thought it looked like a tumor of some kind.

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He was then transferred to Memorial Hermann in the Woodlands for further testing. After a brain biopsy, it was determined that he had a glioblastoma (Stage IV), the most lethal and aggressive form of brain cancer. He was referred to doctors at MD Anderson where he was told he was not a candidate for surgery since the tumor was in a place where his speech and memory were located. The risks were that he could very possibly become blind, mute, and/or paralyzed with surgery. He was put on radiation and chemo by mouth. After that treatment ended, the MRIs showed that the tumor had grown. Because of the way it had grown, though, he was now a candidate for surgery. There were two parts of the tumor, a smaller section that they could try to remove, and a much larger one that they could not attempt to remove because of the way it was spread out and attached like fingers to his brain. On July 2, he underwent a 6 hour surgery. They were successful in that they were able to remove 97 - 98% of the one tumor. After 6 weeks, he returned for more testing and found that the tumor had started to grow back.

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He has now started on two experimental drugs through IV. He goes every two weeks for the lab work and treatment. He'll do this for 3 or 4 treatments and if it shows that it's working, he'll continue this for the next two years. Mitch has had terrible headaches for months and has recently had some relief. He has had some speech
problems and trouble processing what people are saying to him. He sometimes has much difficulty in saying what he wants to say because it's "on the tip of his tongue" but he just can't get it out. But, even though it's very difficult, he's trying hard to get through this day by day.