Survivor doesn't let July heartbreaks keep her down
WEST SUNBURY — Just when the clutches of chemotherapy, depression and grief seemed to reach their darkest days, Debbie Hutchinson woke up to find her husband of 22 years dead in his favorite recliner.
She pauses to catch her breath and wipe her eyes when she reaches this point in the story.
“I asked why God hated me so bad,” said Hutchison, 55.
After her husband Tim's death, Hutchinson said she was ready to stop the treatments that were making her ill and had already taken her hair.
Friends and family swayed her to believe tomorrow was worth seeing. She dug deep and fought for her own life.
“That's the advice I'd give to other people just getting a diagnosis of the big C word,” said Hutchinson, a breast cancer and lymphoma survivor in remission.
“When you first hear it, the C word, the first thing you think is 'death.' It's a very long road to walk. But you have to fight and remember there's always someone who has it worse than you do.”
It was July that things got rough for Hutchinson.
Any July. Most Julys. “I hate July,” she said.
July 13, 1996, for example. That was the day her son, Clair Louis Glenn, 19, died in an ATV accident. The anniversary causes her grief every year.
Or maybe July 2012, when unexpectedly a nipple on one of her breasts inverted.
“I had no pain or anything. I had no idea why that happened,” said Hutchinson, noting she'd had a mammogram only months earlier that showed nothing. Yet a month later the biopsy results came back: Stage three breast cancer.
Then there's July 24, 2013. That's the day — a half-dozen months into chemotherapy — that she found her husband dead.
Tim had heart and lung problems, and he'd had his own share of hospital trips in recent years.
“But I wasn't expecting him to go then ... like that,” she said. “He took care of me until the day he died.”
Friends rallied for Hutchinson to fight for her life. Neighbors rallied. Hutchinson's mother, Mary Schultheis of Lyndora, rallied ... even gave up rounds of golf to take her to her appointments.
“You have no idea how important that was,” Hutchinson said. “It was pretty special.”
Hutchinson's daughter, Heather Bayless, is a nurse, “and you have no idea what it's like to be sick and have a nurse in your family.”And Hutchinson herself rallied. She has two grandchildren, 8-year-old Sydney Bayless and 3-year-old Greg Bayless, who she wants to watch grow up.“They're my strength to move on,” she said. “I love them so much.”Hutchinson, who now works as a cook, loves to ride motorcycles and spend quiet time with her “best friend” Cooper, who is an 8-year-old Buckskin Walking horse.“I tell him all my secrets, and he doesn't tell anyone,” said Hutchinson, who lives on the 100-acre farm she grew up on.“I asked my doctor when will I have the strength to get on my horse again,” she said. “And I worked for that. I was determined to get back on that horse. Riding keeps me sane.”In August 2013 she had her last chemotherapy treatment, followed by radiation. She's been in remission ever since but still has a port on her body and monthly trips to the oncologist.She says she feels better now. But it's a different “better” than before this all took place.She's a member of Butler Breast Cancer and Women's Cancer Support Group and plans to be a speaker in coming months on what it's like to lose your hair. She also helps out with the Ride for the Cure, which benefits Butler County residents.Things are looking up for Hutchinson. But she still hates Julys.This year her brother-in-law 45-year-old Scott P. Hutchison of Petrolia died as a result of a dirt bike accident.In July.
