Steve’s Story

Steve passed away at 3:30am on Friday the 13th 2009. He died peacefully in his sleep at Friends’ House in Santa Rosa, the hospice he was moved to the previous morning. His brother, Ron, and sister-in-law, Wendy, were with him when he died.

Steve had been moved to the hospice from Kaiser Hospital in Santa Rosa after a determination that he had slipped into an irreversible coma and nothing further could be done. Most of Steve’s friends and family visited with him during the day, remembering previous escapades and swapping stories. A disc golf basket (post hole) was placed outside his window and he seemed to take comfort from the “ching” of the chains as friends took turns putting.

There were phone calls from friends too far away to visit and Steve seemed to respond to the voices. He became quieter as the day went on, then finally let go and slipped away in the early morning.

Steve was diagnosed with Stage IV Esophageal cancer on March 6, 2008. An initial course of radiation therapy was successful in shrinking the primary tumor to the point where the insertion of a stent was not needed, but the cancer had already spread to the liver. Through his ongoing chemotherapy Steve remained hopeful and actually had more good days than bad. Recent scans of his liver showed all but one of the tumors in his liver where shrinking and Steve was planning a visit with his brother in Washington where he would continue his chemotherapy at the Kaiser Hospital there. Then a few weeks
ago he began to experience back pain which he initially thought was due to twisting his back while on an outing. When he began to experience weakness in his legs a cat scan of his back was ordered which revealed a tumor on his spine. When an additional course of radiation was prescribed, he was still planning on making the trip because he had such good results from the previous course. He had finished that course on Monday, March 9th. He was feeling the exhaustion and weakness associated with radiation therapy but expected that to pass in a few days. No one had any inkling that the tumor had already spread to his brain.

On Tuesday, the 10th, while on the phone with his brother, Ron, Steve became non responsive. His caregiver check on him and found him weak and a little lethargic but otherwise ok. While checking a few hours later, Steve suffered a seizure and was transported to Kaiser Hospital in Santa Rosa. There the doctors did a scan of his had and found a 2 cm tumor in the area of his hypothalamus and several smaller tumors scattered throughout. Steve never regained consciousness and expired 1 year and 7 days after his initial diagnosis. He was 38 years old.

Steve is survived by his brother, Ron, and sister-in-law, Wendy of Seattle, WA, his mother, Sandra, of Rohnert Park and numerous members of his extended Disc Golf family.

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