10/26/11
Mary Ann Lindsay passed away at 5:20 pm Wednesday Oct 26, 2011. She had fallen two weeks ago and had a subdural hematoma and was in the hospital 5 days. She came home and then fell again Tuesday morning. Scans showed additional bleeding so I brought her home for hospice care. A good friend from Alaska was visiting, she is a nurse, so Cynthia was a big help to me getting her turned every two hours and giving the various meds along with hospice care.
Mary Ann started this journey 10 years
ago by having her left kidney removed, but the cancer was already in her lungs.
She endured 6 weeks of treatment at UCLA Medical center in 2002 and was in
remission for 2 and a half years. Then she started a 5 plus year trip of chemo,
7 different ones, and some radiation. In May of 2009 she collapsed at a
friend’s house in Canada and the cancer was now in her brain. She had full
brain radiation and a new chemo and was then monitored closely with scans and
MRI's every 2 or 3 months. She was off all treatment for 18 months as her
oncologist, Dr. Tezcan wanted her to have some quality of life.
The progression of Renal Cell Carcinoma
is from the kidney to the lungs to the brain to the bone.
6 weeks ago the MRI showed cancer in the T-7 vertebrae and it was not there just 3 months before. So she did more radiation and started a new chemo. At that time the oncologist put a time limit on her for the first time. 6 months if the chemo worked, 2 months if it didn't.
Renal cell patients typically live 6 to
12 months after diagnosis and that's a 10% chance at best. She fooled the
doctors for nine years with her incredible will to live and her sense of
purpose.
Mary Ann trialed her Border Collies
every chance she got all over the Pacific Northwest and she won many times. But
for her it was more about the friendships and joy of competition than the
winning. Just last week she and her latest dog Hemp were awarded the 2010/2011
Oregon Stock Dog Novice Championship.
She will be missed by so many friends all
over the country and by her two sons, Patrick Glines, a master instructor for
Guide Dogs for the Blind in Portland, OR, and her son John Glines and
Granddaughter Taylor Ann in Santa Maria CA.
And of course by the adopters who became
friends over all these years. There are dogs in 40 states and Canada and all of
the adopters had to come to our home in Hayden Lake, ID. She wanted to meet the
people and talk with them to make sure it was a good match for life for both the
dog and the adopters.
How can you put into a few words how
amazing and loving and caring Mary Ann was. You can't. For those of us who had
the opportunity to know and love her, we all have our own memories of her that
we will hold close.
Goodbye for now Mary Ann, we will meet in
heaven with Jesus Christ at the Rainbow Bridge where all of your dogs are
waiting for you.
I love you
Jim