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Michael Schiller's Story

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Michael Schiller Posting Date - August 21, 1996
Last Modified: November 1, 2001

Copyright © 1996, Michael Schiller

My name is Mike Schiller, I'm a survivor of cancer. Seven years ago, when Iwas six years old, I was diagnosed with a ganglioglioma brain tumor. I wassuccessfully treated at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia with surgery andradiation. This web site will give support to all kinds of people involvedwith cancer and its victims, and let them express any fears, or askquestions about my experience.

Being involved in any way with a cancer patient, or family of one, can be achallenging situation in itself. I have heard numerous stories of how hardit was for family and friends of the patient. My sister stayed with familyand friends. I can still remember when she first talked to me on the phoneafter my operation. She immediately asked whether I was in one piece. Iwas only six, and she was nine. We were kids. We hadn't seen each otherfor one week, but when one of us was being treated for a deadly disease, itseemed like months. My parents focused all of their attention on me. Theywent through the same crisis that I did and they wee part of my recovery.

Plenty of people came to visit me, and I remember vividly the faces ofvisitors when they saw me laying in a hospital bed hooked up to machines andI.V.'s They were all feeling sorry for me. But now you would never knowthat I even had cancer.

I'm a survivor. I'm alive and well. I can still do normal things and be ateenager. I enjoy playing piano in the middle school jazz band, andpreparing for my upcoming Bar Mitzvah. I even feel that I have more thanothers when I notice that not all of the people in the world can say thatthey are survivors of cancer. Not many people can wake up each day with the knowledge that it should be lived to the fullest. But still in this hugeworld we call home, not many can include a whole lot of survivors. Ithappened to me. It can happen. I'm living proof of that.