Remembering Bob

My husband Bob Babcock, the smartest and funniest man I have ever met, passed away before I could barely pronounce the name given of the cancer that killed him, let alone spell it: “Glioblastoma multiform” (GBM).

I had never heard of this “thing” because there wasn’t much awareness for this cancer.

Tomorrow, July 17 is “Glioblastoma Awareness Day” which can help take this darkest of circumstances and use it into something good so that someday, everyone WILL know how to pronounce and spell “Glioblastoma multiform” and someday everyone will know that there are treatments available for this brain tumor for which there are none … now.

Bob loved watching all sports, listening to all music and playing his Martin guitar. He studied the bible; and he drove everyone crazy with all his conspiracy theories. But summer 2014, slowly most of his interests were not interesting to him anymore and his witty and funny personality was disappearing. Then a seizure in October 2014 caught our attention and he was diagnosed with GBM. He endured the horrific “standard treatment” of surgery, aggressive radiation and chemotherapy along with taking a myriad of medications, mostly those meds were to help him adjust to the side-effects from all the damage to his body from the “standard treatment”.

He succumbed in May 2015. We were together for over 36 years.

In 2014, I knew nothing about GBM, but as his caregiver, I had to learn quick. What I’ve learned as of today is nothing works … and this has to change.

Dedicating July 17 as “Glioblastoma Awareness Day” will help bring additional brain tumor awareness and hopefully a demand for more research and a cure for all brain tumors.

Gray matters as much as pink.

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Opinions expressed within this story belong solely to the author and do not reflect the views or opinions of the National Brain Tumor Society.