Farrah's Story

We watched the painful odyssey of Farrah Fawcett as she has waged a battle against the insidious anal cancer that has spread to her liver. The two-hour program on NBC, which aired Friday evening (May 15), was a profile in courage and determination but despite all of that the outcome looks bleak.

It was painful to watch not only what Farrah has gone through with her cancer treatment and the ravages of the treatments on her body, but equally heartbreaking to see Ryan O'Neil loving her so and grieving that is so raw. Even more painful to see her son 'Red' at her bedside...in shackles. He is serving some time in jail for a drug conviction, but was allowed three hours for a final visit with his mother. The jailers who escorted him to her home would not allow him out of the shackles on his legs, but did release him from the handcuffs so he could cuddle with his mother one last time.

Heartbreaking...

And it is heartbreaking and sad not only because it is Farrah with whom we have grown up watching and knowing from television and the movies over so many years, but because it is a template of what ordinary people go through every day around the world. Farrah is simply a high profile personality who has been able to bring more light to the disease process in a public way.

It is all tragic...for Farrah, for Ryan, for 'Red', and for anyone and everyone who receives a cancer diagnosis.

As I watched Farrah's Story and wept, her constant unwavering statement was, "I want to live." That reminded me so much of my own mother's remark to me years and years ago. Mama said, "I don't mind getting old. I just don't want to die."