“We’re going to start at the very beginning. March 2006.
I want you to tell me when you first thought something was amiss with your leg.”
“Do we have to use a tape recorder, Mom?”
“I want to get your voice on tape.”
“Why?”
“Because.”
(groan) “Well, I was skateboarding with my friend Alex, and we were trying to ollie the curb which basically means, ‘jump’, (chuckles) while keeping your feet on the board. I fell and it was excruciating. There was this pretty noticeable lump under my left knee…I knew it wasn’t normal to hurt that much from such a small impact, so I knew something was wrong.”
“Do you remember having a strange feeling that this was not a muscle tear?”
“I was hoping it was a medical mystery and I would have a disease named after me.”
___________________________________________
These are the words caught on tape one year after Brooks Paul was diagnosed with a malignant bone tumor in his left leg - osteosarcoma. (Terry Fox, Edward Kennedy, Jr.) Never in my wildest dreams did I think that my happy, healthy, piano playing kid would be diagnosed with cancer. And lose a leg to it? Unheard of!
Click here for Oct07 LA Times Article written by his mom Pamela Welky Paul
Intense chemotherapy treatments ran for forty weeks, requiring him to remain overnight in the hospital two weeks a month. The strain on his newly-divorced parents and little brother was overwhelming, but Brooks hung in there.
Click here for Nov07 LA Times Article written by his mom Pamela Welky Paul
Scoring a 2020 on his SAT, he now plays six different musical instruments
and wants to study surgery at UCLA, USC or Stanford.
Mostly, he just wants to run again.
This year’s contributions to the Talbert Family Foundation
will go toward a prosthetic running leg for Brooks.
After all, he’s got a lot of living to catch up to.
