10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`
`Search...
`
`
`
`
`
`ORAL HISTORY
`
`PODCASTS
`
`SURVIVOR STORIES
`
`CLINICAL TRIALS
`
`COLON CANCER
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks let to live
`with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission
`
`By Cancer History Project
`
`June 10, 2022
`
`Preview
`
`This is the second installment of the Cancer History Project’s series in honor of Cancer Survivors Month.
`
`The interviews are conducted by Deborah Doroshow, assistant professor of medicine, hematology, and medical
`oncology at the Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, who is also a historian of medicine
`and a guest editor of the Cancer History Project in June.
`
`Last week’s oral history with Judy Orem, a CML patient who was part of the initial clinical trial for Gleevec, is available
`here.
`
`At 25, Elizabeth Carner was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer. 
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`1/26
`
`Cancer Survivors Month: How Beth Carner went from six weeks le to live with stage 4 colon
`
`Cancer Survivors Month: How Beth Carner went from six weeks le to live with stage 4 colon
`
`Jun 10 · The Cancer History Project
`
`Save on Spoti
`
`1
`
`JHU 2123
`Merck Sharp v. Johns Hopkins
`IPR2024-00649
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`“I mean, the rst thing that went through my head was just looking at mom and dad, and it’s just like, OK, well, where did
`all the other stages go? Because we literally went from my colonoscopy as being OK to everything’s not OK,” Carner, now
`33, said to Deborah Doroshow, an oncologist at the Tisch Cancer Institute, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.  
`
`At the time, Carner, who studied theater and stage management as an undergraduate, had a coveted job at an equity
`theater, Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park. She hadn’t thought much of her recent weight loss before the diagnosis—going
`from 175 to around 150—chalking it up to the hustle of theater life. 
`
`Then, one day, Carner fainted at work.
`
`“I was bleeding out,” she said. “When I was in the bathroom, just trying to gure out how to manage this, I looked in the
`mirror and I realized that my face was ghost-white. I’m pale to begin with—with the genetics of the red hair and blue eyes
`and everything under the sun, burn like a lobster, whatnot. But for me to see this and just be like, ‘Oh, shit, I need to talk to
`somebody about this.’”
`
`Carner knew members of her family were carriers of Lynch syndrome, a genetic mutation that increases the risk of colon,
`endometrial, and other cancers. Her grandmother had survived ovarian cancer in the 1950s. Her father had been a survivor
`of stage I colon cancer. Great uncles and second cousins had all experienced stage 1 or 2 cancer—all when they were over
`the age of 45.  
`
`Her family could even trace its history with cancer back to around 1800, to a relative they nicknamed ‘Cancer
`Catherine’—“We believe that she is the one that had married into the family and brought it along.”
`
`Over centuries, cancer became a part of the family lore. 
`
`“It was one of those things where you get told about family history, but you think it’s never going to happen to you. It
`didn’t quite click,” Carner said. “I knew that there was colon cancer history in my family, which we had openly talked about.
`But the thing was, it didn’t even register for me, because all of those instances—the age was 45. I think at the time, the
`screening age was 50 and since then they’ve knocked it down to 45, but it wasn’t even on my register.” 
`
`Carner had been screened for colon cancer pretty much yearly. She had a colonoscopy just before she moved away from
`her family in Rockford, IL, and had another since then in Cincinnati. Doctors had previously found polyps, but they were
`benign.  
`
`The bleeding subsided ater Carner went to the emergency room, but continued at home. She knew another colonoscopy
`was necessary. 
`
`“This go around, the doctor went in and found it. Apparently my cancer was not on the inside of my colon, it was on the
`outside,” she said. “How they explained it to me, is that the inside was the lower—the polyp was the lower, but on the
`other side was all the root.” 
`
`Thus began a months-long odyssey of six hour drives to Mayo Clinic, where Carner’s grandmother had previously been a
`patient. 
`
`“To be perfectly honest, I think those were hard because you’re doing the six hour drive up. And when you have six month
`appointments, or three months appointments, weather turns crappy and everything,” Carner said. 
`
`The combination of cancer and the aggressive treatment she opted for meant that it was dicult for Carner to keep food
`down. Her weight dropped from 150 to 119—on her 5’11 frame.  
`
`“I had to tell my friends, literally everything is tasting like cardboard. I would choke it down if I could, but it’s not staying,”
`she said. “I never, never, never want to have to compare myself to a Holocaust victim, but I remember looking in the mirror
`one time and being like, ‘Oh, shit, I’ve seen these photographs before.’
`
`“Seeing your pelvic bones when you come out of a shower is—no shakes. I can’t listen to weight watching radio ads
`anymore. I can’t do it. They say lose so many pounds in so many months, I’m like, that’s not healthy. Don’t.”
`
`The treatments physically exhausted Carner. Her mother insisted that she take naps so that she could have energy when
`friends came to visit.  
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`2/26
`
`2
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`“But the thing was, a lot of the times it didn’t quite work because I’m one of those people where I get excited to see them,”
`she said. “A lot of on-the-mattress savasana, more or less. Which also is another reason why—morbid personality that I
`am—I completely understand why they call it ‘corpse pose’ now.” 
`
`Mentally, it was dicult for Carner to see college friends embark on their careers, relationships, and personal lives. 
`
`“The thing that probably hurt more than the surgical procedure to remove the darn cancers, was going up on social
`media,” she said. “And mind you, [I had] a recent gut wound, in which they always say hurts worse than any other type of
`wound. And it may be just the psychology. But I probably had more regret and hard time coping with the fact that every
`time it felt like I turned around—I was seeing this from one of my friends. ‘Oh, look at the ring. Oh, look at this. Oh, look at
`how my life’s taking of.’ 
`
`“And here I am, having to put my whole life and dreams on pause because of the fact that I got something that I didn’t ask
`for,” Carner said. 
`
`Carner found that her family’s to-the-point nature, and her snarky attitude at doctor’s visits, kept people upbeat. 
`
`“The medical team really appreciated me being the morbid, smart-alecky, sassy, redhead that came in,” she said. She’d say
`things like—“‘Hey, I was really happy to see you earlier. I wish I didn’t have to, but I’m really happy to see you. I’m glad that
`you’re taking care of me.’”
`
`At the same time, few people could understand how Carner was feeling. 
`
`“It’s hard to say that anybody really, I felt, truly got it. Because one, I didn’t want them to get it. Because if they would’ve
`gotten it, they would’ve gone through the same hell that I went through,” she said. “I think it was very telling when I told
`my parents: ‘OK. I remember my bullies from elementary school, and from high school, and all that stuf.’ I was like, ‘I
`would not wish this on them.’” 
`
`If anything, Cancer Catherine was a comfort. 
`
`“The family history thing is monumental, especially when you go to a gravesite and you think about… ’Oh, crap. Man, they
`might have actually experienced the same thing I have,’” she said. “I mean, it’s mixed emotions, but more or less it’s not
`anger. It’s not sadness. It’s more or less like, ‘Dude, man, I feel like you.’” 
`
`TJ, a friend of Carner’s mother, was bedridden with lung cancer. She  understood. 
`
`“I went to go visit her, and she was talking about the treatment and the pain she was in, and then talking about morphine
`and all that stuf. And I was just like, ‘I’m sorry, I know you’re in a lot of pain, and I really don’t know how to,’” she said. “She’s
`like, ‘I know you do.’ This is what I mean, talking about, I want my friends to get it, but I don’t, because that was the hardest
`thing of just both of us knowing that each of us felt that pain.”  
`
`In January 2015, doctors told Carner and her family that she had six weeks to live. She recalls her father giving her a choice:
`“Do you want to try and go back up to Mayo or do you not feel like you want to?”  
`
`Though faced with snow and ice and rapidly deteriorating health—she had been in a wheelchair by that point—Carner
`decided to go. That’s when Carner rst heard about the clinical trial that would eventually cure her cancer.
`
`“The doctor we were seeing had a colleague, and he was just like, ‘Hey, my colleague is over at Ohio State, and they’re part
`of a study that’s for this new immunotherapy drug. And they’re trying to try it out on a couple of the cancers. It’s mostly
`been used for lung cancer,’” Carner said. 
`
`The drug has since become known as Keytruda (pembrolizumab), and doctors thought Carner might be a good candidate
`because of her specic genetic mutation—MSI (microsatellite unstable)-H. 
`
`When she arrived at the desk of Richard Goldberg, a GI oncologist, who at the time was the physician-in-chief at The Ohio
`State University Comprehensive Cancer Center, Carner had tumors in her neck, breasts, and abdomen. She had previously
`had masses on her knee and her brain.  
`
`When Goldberg previously spoke with The Cancer Letter about Carner’s case, he described her response to Keytruda as “The
`Lazarus efect” (The Cancer Letter, Oct. 13, 2017).  
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`3/26
`
`3
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`“She had exhausted conventional therapy, she came in in a wheelchair, she just had her femur pinned…she was so
`depressed, she could barely hold a conversation,” he said. “Here is the 26-year-old who is dying of advanced cancer.” 
`
`Carner started the trial in February, and within a few months had gone from a wheelchair to crutches—only requiring the
`wheelchair when she tired easily. By April or May, doctors had found that the drug was working. 
`
`“It was rather drastic,” she said. “I mean, for Dr. Goldberg to see me, when I rst walked in, I didn’t even walk into his oce.
`It was like, I rolled into his oce with my family, because I had my crutches and I was in a wheelchair. I was tired. I couldn’t
`really hold my head up as much as I was trying. Posture is not a forte when you’re sick.” 
`
`How could she tell the drug was taking efect? 
`
`“I don’t want to necessarily say my mood was improving, but it was more or less the numbers, the blood counts and all the
`blood draws,” she said.  
`
`About a year out from starting the trial, doctors didn’t nd any evidence of cancer. Carner remains in complete remission
`—eight years from when she was rst diagnosed.
`
`She joined the theater world again, and was in the ensemble of a local production of “Assassins” in summer 2016, when
`her father died suddenly of a heart attack. 
`
`“And the thing that’s a little bit dicult is that I’m happy that he knew that I was on the up and up. Like I said, I was
`graduated from three months to six months for appointments. He knew I was actively trying to do what I loved and get
`back to normal. None of us were ready for that,” she said. 
`
`“The drug worked, and I [was] trying to get my life back on track with everything else that apparently has been thrown at
`[me], which has more or less afected my entire family because of the loss of a parent—but then also me trying to dive
`back into theater on a production level,” she said. 
`
`Carner received her Masters in arts administration in 2019, and is currently in the ensemble for a production of “Hello,
`Dolly!” 
`
`“And that’s the other thing that I’m just trying to come to terms with, and this comes with job applications or just in
`general, is like, I now have to think of myself as, I’m healthy, but I have to consider the fact that my body’s not how it is
`internally as it should have been probably,” she said.
`
`Transcript
`
`Deborah Doroshow: Hi, Beth. Thanks for joining me today. We’re here to talk with The Cancer History Project, a
`little bit about you and your experiences. I’m wondering if I could just start by asking you to tell me a little bit
`about yourself.
`
`Beth Carner: Now, I’m 33 years old. I had my birthday in February.
`
`Me too.
`
`BC: It’s really funny. I’m happy and thrilled. I know everybody freaks out about 30, but I’m actually loving it right now. I
`never thought I’d actually say this, more or less, not because of everything that’s happened with me, but because I never
`visualized myself attaining this—but I now have my Masters, in essentially arts administration from Northwestern.
`
`That’s been fun and a really wonderful roller coaster. I’m still doing what I love, and was originally setting out to do when I
`let college. I mean, also life has been throwing everybody some curveballs. The pandemic threw a big, huge wrench in
`that. Not just mine, but everybody’s.
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`4/26
`
`4
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`
`For sure.
`
`BC: Other than that, daughter, sister, friend, weird or regular—it kind of depends.
`
`Fantastic. I know we talked about this earlier, but you’re currently practicing, you’re currently rehearsing for a
`production of “Hello, Dolly!” In which you’re in the ensemble, which is very exciting.
`
`BC: It’s great to be able to dance and move around. I was so excited because I haven’t worked with this choreographer
`since I was 16. That was a really big, wonderful surprise, but also just really nice because when you’re a teenager, you start
`learning this choreography, you have no bloody idea what you’re doing. As an adult, having had a little bit of training,
`you’re just like—”oh yes, please get me more.”
`
`Fantastic.
`
`BC: I’ve been loving it. I’ve been sweating, but I’ve absolutely been thrilled to do it.
`
`That’s fantastic. Congratulations. Let’s see. Do you want to take us back to maybe college, and how things
`evolved from there? Whatever starting point you think makes sense.
`
`BC: I guess it would probably start immediately ater I graduated in college. I was a transfer student at Beloit College. With
`transfer students and trying to make sure all your credits are aligned, and you get what you need to graduate, I was maybe
`about half of a semester behind everybody else for when I originally wanted to graduate.
`
`I graduated in December of 2012 in a theater, stage management capacity, with a minor in history. I was very excited. I was
`actually so enthused. I was doing an internship at Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park, which was an equity theater.
`
`I couldn’t have been happier for that to be my place, because everybody wants to work in an equity theater if you’re going
`to do this professionally and get your foot in the door properly. I was super enthused. I got to work with wonderful people.
`I’ve been keeping track of their careers since then. That’s been fun and phenomenal—and rooting from the sidelines.
`
`Unfortunately, ater I nished, or barely a few months before I was due to nish my contract, I had an episode, I guess,
`would be the lack of a better word for it, where I was bleeding out at work.
`
`I actually had a little bit of a fainting spell. I called the stage manager, she was in the green room. Her and the wardrobe
`mistress, who I had become very good friends with, we conferred and gured that the best course of action was just to
`take me to the emergency room because I was losing blood.
`
`I mean, being a female, you’re just like, OK, maybe I’m having my period. When I was in the bathroom, just trying to gure
`out how to manage this, I looked in the mirror and I realized that my face was ghost-white. I’m pale to begin with—with
`the genetics of the red hair and blue eyes and everything under the sun, burn like a lobster, whatnot. But for me to see this
`and just be like, “Oh, shit, I need to talk to somebody about this.”
`
`[It] really kind of hit home. The wardrobe mistress, who’s still a really good friend and we exchange letters, she took me to
`the local hospital, took me to the ER, where I remember walking in there with her and telling the nurse my full name, but
`that was as far as I got, because ater that, I think I dropped to the loor. The next thing I know they’re putting me in a
`wheelchair, taking me into a room and giving me IVs and all that other stuf. Yeah.
`
`Because it was an internship in Cincinnati and I’m originally from Illinois and Rockford, that meant that I had to call my
`parents and give the news like, “Hey, guess what? I’m in the hospital. I feel ne.” But my mom wasn’t having any of that. My
`dad, at the time, he was like, yeah, there was no way on earth that we weren’t going to make that six hour drive to come
`see you and see how everything was going.
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`5/26
`
`5
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`I ended up nishing out my contract, which actually, I mean, at the time—had been extended because I was taking over
`from another intern who had been there the year previously. She had just received a job ofer at one of the Shakespeare
`festivals out west.
`
`In a way, I got to extend my stay longer than I thought, but not under the circumstances that I really would’ve appreciated
`and liked. But I did go away from that experience with quite a few friends and a very good experience from it. Hopefully I
`was like, OK, I’ll go home, gure everything out and then I’ll just … because I was trying to apply and gure out a way to
`stay around so I could potentially work or do more equity theater.
`
`But then when I got home, I had the same episode happen again.
`
`What happened? You were in the emergency room, they gave you luids, and what happened ater that?
`
`BC: The bleeding was under control, but what had happened at the Playhouse is that I was, rectally bleeding out.
`
`The thing was, this is March, April. I had a bit of the lu. I was throwing up in the bathroom. The other kicker was,
`everybody talks about weight loss being a little bit of a indicator of…like a drastic weight loss. But the thing was, stage
`managers and theater people tend to run around a lot just because it’s a lot of, as they say, hustle.
`
`I was because I was like OK, well I’m already doing a lot of steps because of the routines and all that stuf that I’m doing. I
`was cutting celery. I think my weight when I rst started there was probably 180, 175 or something about. I was like, OK,
`well I’m a little bit on the pudgy side. It gives or takes. With my height being 5’11 and whatnot, there’s a ne edge that you
`end up teetering on. I was like, I would maybe like to get down to 150, that’d be cool, or 155, that’d be ne. I’d reached that
`goal. I don’t think it was a quick process, but it certainly wasn’t anything that I had thought about.
`
`Regardless of the fact that there—I mean, I knew that there was colon cancer history in my family, which we had openly
`talked about. But the thing was, it didn’t even register for me, because all of those instances—the age was 45. I think at the
`time, the screening age was 50 and since then they’ve knocked it down to 45, but it wasn’t even on my registe.
`
`I’d come home and was trying to get through stuf. I’m still optimistic and I’m like, oh yeah, I’m just going to do this.
`Another episode happened at home and I’m just like, OK, we’re checking this out because there’s something going on.
`
`I was scheduled to have another colonoscopy as well. Like I said, family history. I’d actually had one, both before I went to
`Cincinnati and while I was down there. They had found polyps, but nothing to indicate cancer. Well, this go around, the
`doctor went in and found it. Apparently my cancer was not on the inside of my colon, it was on the outside.
`
`How they explained it to me, is that the inside was the lower—the polyp was the lower, but on the other side was all the
`root.
`
`The doctor walked in and he was like, it’s stage 4. The only thing me and my dad and my mom and I were thinking is—I’m
`25. This is 20 years ahead of everything. Not to mention the fact that nobody in my family, male or female, had ever heard
`of anybody in our family getting it this quick. I mean, the rst thing that went through my head was just looking at mom
`and dad, and it’s just like, OK, well, where did all the other stages go? Because we literally went from my colonoscopy as
`being OK to everything’s not OK.
`
`The doctor told me, when he said that, I remember looking over at mom and dad, and we’re all in a little bit of shock. But
`then I—and I’m not trying to play superhero, this is just how I remember it. I mean, maybe my mom remembers it
`diferently.
`
`My sister was still away at school. But I remember looking at the doctor, “I was like, OK, what now?”
`
`Can I ask you, in that moment when you were sitting with the doctor, can you tell me a little bit about how that
`doctor broke the news? Because you said he just said it’s stage 4. If you could give me a little bit more detail
`about how he gave you that information.
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`6/26
`
`6
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`BC: Well, the nice thing is, Dr. Patel, and unfortunately he was a local doctor that’s no longer here, but he had a really good
`rapport with my dad. My dad’s side of the family is actually where the colon cancer comes from. We had a bit of a rapport,
`and Dr. Patel knew that .we don’t tend to like the sugar coating. It’s like, just give it to us straight. It’s not going to change
`the outcome.
`
`Had you had any suspicion that cancer might be in the mix?
`
`BC: No. I mean, I wasn’t guring on looking out for this until I hit 45.
`
`I was guring … I was like, OK, I’ll be 45, 50, have kids potentially, maybe a grandkid on the way. I don’t know. I mean, I had
`no idea what my life was going to contain, but it certainly wasn’t this.
`
`It was one of those things where you get told about family history, but you think it’s never going to happen to you. It didn’t
`quite click. I do know that, well, ater that, like I said, my dad’s family is the side that has the colon cancer and it comes
`through his maternal side. My grandmother was still living at the time, and she had a patient relationship with Mayo,
`more or less.
`
`We ended up going up there for chemo, radiation for me. We did the genetic background. I have—and it started with her,
`so it’s not going very far, but that meant that my little sister was also tested.
`
`Let me stop you for a second while I go back and delve into a couple…
`
`BC: Oh, there’s quite a lot.
`
`This is perfect. Let me just delve into a couple of things. You said that your dad and Dr. Patel had a pretty good
`relationship and that your whole family, you were people who like to hear things very bluntly. What happened
`when you were like, where did all the other stages go? What do we do now? What did he say?
`
`BC: I don’t think there was an answer, because I think he was just about as baled as the rest of us. The fact that we had
`done our due diligence, so he had done the colonoscopies on me.
`
`It was just a matter of, I think, once we realized that it was on the outside, and that’s not particularly the rst place that
`everybody looks in a colonoscopy because you’re inside a colon.
`
`I’m not even sure whether there is a procedure to view the outside of your intestines. Just more or less, I think it was the
`realization of, OK, there’s potential for this thing to pop up in whatever stage it bloody well pleases, no matter how
`diligent or how oten you do. Because I think at that point I was doing it yearly, I think.
`
`You were just getting yearly colonoscopies?
`
`BC: I’m thinking yearly colonoscopies, but I think it was … when we found the rst polyp, which was, I believe the word is
`benign.
`
`It was benign, but they were just like, OK, well, we found a polyp, we cut it of, and there wasn’t any indication of this—it’s
`benign. But because of your history, we’re going to do this again. Was the conversation that had happened.
`
`Hence why I ended up having a colonoscopy in Cincinnati and not under Dr. Patel. Like you said, it’s just one of those
`things where it’s just trying to comprehend the fact that you’re just like, OK, I know there’s stages. You’re just trying to
`gure out, OK, what happened to make it progress so fast?
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`7/26
`
`7
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`
`What did you do when you guys got home from that visit?
`
`BC: I think it was just a little bit of, more or less a shock, and trying to gure out what the game plan was ater that, which
`had been discussed while I was in the hospital a little bit. So many years have passed, and also it’s your memory’s trying to
`block out the bad juju and whatnot. I do remember going into that colonoscopy, it felt like it was an emergency
`colonoscopy because they wanted to check out why I was bleeding.
`
`You guys went home and you thought, OK, well, we have to nd out more. We have to plan. Where’d you go to get
`more information?
`
`BC: Well, the nice thing was, our family, along with being very blunt, is very good at passing along about as much as we
`can for family history.
`
`Which is very, very benecial. I know from my mom’s side, there’s a history of Alzheimer’s because I actually saw that one
`rsthand because my grandfather did have it. He did not pass away from the disease. He passed away from prostate, but
`it’s still a heartbreaking thing to see.
`
`On my dad’s side, like I said, the colon cancer originates with…my grandmother didn’t have colon [cancer], she had
`ovarian. For the longest time, it was believed in the family that the men got colon, the women got ovarian. My
`grandmother, she got ovarian cancer, I think, at age 32, around the age I am, actually.
`
`But the thing was, and lucky for her, she had already had my father and my uncle. I believe during the 1950-era, that the
`procedures were not up to what they are now, where there’s options or something. Thankfully my dad and my uncle were
`already born, and that wasn’t really a problem with me coming down the line.
`
`There had been a whole lot of discussion, but I mean, I know that my great-uncles have. Second cousins that have
`experienced this, but they’re all older than me. They all experienced it at 45. It wasn’t the degree of, oh, stage 4. This is, oh,
`it’s stage 1 or stage 2.
`
`Truth be told, I haven’t reached out to those cousins because there’s enough of an age gap between us that I really
`probably have never met them in my entire life. There is one lady, as we were talking about earlier, talking about doctors
`going back in history and nding a patient who was back in the 1800s.
`
`We actually have an ancestor that is known in our family, and this is going to sound so bad because I feel so bad for the
`lady, her nickname in the family is Cancer Catherine. We believe that she is the one that had married into the family and
`brought it along, which is a horrible way to think about it.
`
`No, it’s what your family needs to do to deal with this. How far back is Cancer Catherine?
`
`BC: I would probably say at least 1800. I’m not entirely sure.
`
`Wow.
`
`BC: I do know that I have been by that woman’s gravesite playing, at least growing up as a kid.
`
`I bet some mixed thoughts toward her.
`
`BC: Well, it’s more or less, the family history thing is monumental, especially when you go to a gravesite and you think
`about, oh, this person. It’s another to realize like, “Oh, crap. Man, they might have actually experienced the same thing I
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`8/26
`
`8
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`have.” I mean, it’s mixed emotions, but more or less it’s not anger. It’s not sadness. It’s more or less like, “Dude, man, I feel
`like you,” kind of thing.” Which is really weird.
`
`No, I think it makes a lot of sense. When you got home and you were guring out what do we do next, were you
`on the internet trying to nd stuf out? Were you reading? Were you trying to ignore the whole thing? What was
`your approach?
`
`BC: No. We were probably very much of the fact that it’s, we don’t like to ignore shit as a family.
`
`Because we tend to nd that everything that we ignore, I mean, not just for us, but just a general broad brushing, it tends
`to bite you in the butt very, very hard if you do that.
`
`Fair enough.
`
`BC: My dad was actually probably very much the researcher of trying to gure out exactly all the stuf that was going on
`with me.
`
`I will say that both my parents working for the airline, my dad’s health benets for me, at age 25, because you have to
`remember, 26 is when everybody bounces you of of everything. I mean, we managed to nd a way that I could stay on his
`insurance. Thank God.
`
`That must have been a relief.
`
`BC: It was a relief. The other thing was, around the time that I got diagnosed, my mom who was a light attendant, the
`company she was working for, was ofering what they refer to as a buyout. They have people who—I believe at the time my
`mom would’ve been 58, 57. They try to get people who are close to a retiring age. For pilots, it’s 65, and most light
`attendants, there’s no retirement age for them, but I think my mom was planning on retiring around the same time.
`
`But buyouts give you extra money, plus all the benets that you will come into, if you say bye-bye early. With me being
`sick and the chemo and radiation, you pick your poison. It’s not exactly a fun, howdy-doo time that I would recommend to
`anyone. Because I went—we were talking about my earlier weight, what was 175, when I was at Cincinnati, and having
`gotten down to, I was a really happy 150. Chemo, radiation and the cancer combined, I at one point dropped my weight,
`not intentionally. I was trying to keep everything down. I was trying.
`
`Of course.
`
`BC: I mean, I get it.
`
`This is a judgment free zone, Beth, really.
`
`BC: I know it is, but for—people don’t get—well, just eat or something like that. I had to tell my friends, literally everything
`is tasting like cardboard. I would choke it down if I could, but it’s not staying. I can’t, which probably goes into the fact that
`now that I eat spaghetti, I’m just liberally putting all sorts of red pepper in that because I was like, taste buds are a
`godsend. But I mean, my weight dropped from 150 to 119, for a 5’11 frame.
`
`I never, never, never want to have to compare myself to a Holocaust victim, but I remember looking in the mirror one time
`and being like, “Oh, shit, I’ve seen these photographs before.”
`
`https://cancerhistoryproject.com/article/how-beth-carner-went-from-six-weeks-left-to-live-with-stage-4-colon-cancer-to-complete-remission/
`
`9/26
`
`9
`
`

`

`10/1/24, 4:39 PM
`
`How Beth Carner went from six weeks left to live with stage 4 colon cancer to complete remission – The Cancer History Project
`
`Wow. That’s terrifying.
`
`BC: It is. Seeing your pelvic bones wh