WILLIAMS, Ariz.—He could see it on the kitchen table in black and white, as plain as the Xerox paper on which it was printed. There was a dark spot on his wife’s lungs that was 2.25 inches in diameter and near her heart.
Tom West, 55, stood quietly and looked at the medical image. But he wasn’t the same person he was a week earlier.
His face was unshaven and his eyes were tired. His voice was trembling at times. He gazed out the window at his friend’s home in Williams, Arizona, and seemed lost.
Holding on to his coffee cup, he confessed, “I am a wreck.”
At first, his wife’s symptoms looked like pneumonia on X-rays. But when her health got worse, it became clear that something else was happening.
She checked into a hospital in Flagstaff, Arizona, on Oct. 31. The doctors did tests and took a CAT scan to get more detailed pictures.
It was bad news. In fact, it couldn’t get any worse.
Shannon Francis-West, 44, who had just become a grandmother, was told that she had lung cancer.
The prospects for her future were uncertain.
“I looked at the size of that tumor—it’s against the heart,” Tom West said. “You’ve got this mass—it’s all the same tumor. This whole thing.”
The “blessing in disguise,” he said, is that the tumor hasn’t metastasized. He said there is time to treat the disease with radiation, chemotherapy, and surgery and hope for the best.
The U.S. Marine and Persian Gulf War veteran has been feeling less himself since his wife was diagnosed with cancer, and he is facing his own health challenges.
He is trying to stay strong as he waits for the results of a colon biopsy.
“I cry—not angry, you know? I pray a lot,” he said. “But I’m still getting out there, too—going out and helping somebody.”
Francis-West, who used to smoke, said her cancer diagnosis was the scariest thing she’s ever had to deal with, but she’s ready to fight.
She said she has a lot to fight for, including a 4-month-old grandson.
“I’m too young to say goodbye,” she said.
Fighting for Veterans
West and Francis-West have called Williams home for the past six years, living in a 36-foot trailer while aiding hundreds of veterans through their nonprofit, Operation: Transition Outside the Wire.They got the idea for a nonprofit when they owned a coffee shop in Huntington Beach, California. Many of their customers were homeless veterans and others who needed a helping hand.
A big part of the nonprofit in Williams was grinding, bagging, and selling bags of coffee to raise money to support veterans and programs.
“My focus must now shift to [Shannon’s] needs as her loving husband and caregiver,” West said on the nonprofit’s website.
The financial burden that cancer imposes is overwhelming, even though West has never asked for help before.
Their $60,000 life savings have already been used up, and it is possible that they'll need to relocate to a lower altitude to let Francis-West breathe more easily.
When she can’t breathe easily, she uses a portable oxygen tank.
“With my health also suffering, it is crucial for me to be fully present for my wife as we navigate her treatment,” West said.
“While we continue to support veterans to the best of our ability, we cannot maintain the same level of support until we have overcome this challenging disease.”
On Nov. 8, West said his wife received “great news” that her PET scan showed that the cancer was not anywhere else in her body.
She has a rare cancer, and the Mayo Clinic is focusing on identifying it and devising a treatment strategy, he said.
‘208 Fewer At-Risk Veterans’
The nonprofit allowed West and his wife to reach 208 at-risk veterans in ways they never could before.They have been able to provide counseling, job training, financial assistance, and suicide prevention.
West dreamed of starting a camp for veterans with the same services but on a larger scale.
Since 2001, more than 131,000 veterans—23 per day—have died by suicide.
West said he has been down in the trenches of life as a veteran of combat during the Gulf War and almost committed suicide living on the streets of Kansas City.
He drank too much and was angry constantly. He struggled with childhood trauma and emotional battlefield scars because he didn’t have structure or support at home.
One day, he put a gun to his head and almost pulled the trigger—almost. He didn’t know how to cope with his feelings until he got help.
“You’re walking an obstacle course that you can’t finish. You don’t have the skills,” West told The Epoch Times.
One thing he has learned about veterans helping veterans is that “iron sharpens iron.”
“I’ve been there. We’re heartbroken every time we lose a veteran,“ West said. ”Forget ’thank you for your service.'”
His wife posted on social media, “If you want to thank a veteran for your service, just be the kind of American worth fighting for.”
When the two met years ago in Huntington Beach, West said he instantly fell in love with his future wife.
“I absolutely loved and admired her. From the moment we were together, we’ve been together 24/7. We’ve taken on everything together,” he said.
“I don’t use the term loosely. She’s my best friend and soulmate.”
West said he doesn’t get angry like he used to since he’s been with Francis-West. He’s more compassionate, his faith has grown, and his reason for living is strong.
West said his phone started to “blow up” with calls from doctors who were concerned about his wife’s recovery.
“Where’s the chapel? I want to go pray,” West asked another doctor.
The doctor responded: “I’ll go and get the chaplain. He’ll go and pray with you.”
West said fighting cancer is like fighting a war at home.
“You know, for everything that we’ve learned [on the battlefield], you’ve got to fight to see the next day,” he said.
“In my 55 years, with all the lessons I’ve learned, there’s one thing that matters the most—and it is love. It’s more important than all the other emotions.
“I think the biggest thing for Shannon and me is faith. We’ve got a church here. They don’t care how you look or how you dress.”
When asked about his biggest fear about the future, West was silent.
“We’re not guaranteed anything,” he said after a long pause. “I don’t focus on what might happen. In fact, it’s not even a conversation we have. It makes you look at life through a better lens.”
Although the last five minutes are out of our control, he said, the next five minutes are ours to choose, so “choose wisely.”
