May is brain tumor awareness month...

The following is my son's account of dealing with a brain tumor. It was written four years ago, when he was eleven years old.

My name is Benjamin Zello. My friends call me Benji. I am eleven years old. I'm a fifth grader at Olympia Elementary. In many ways I'm just like all of you. I like hanging out with my brother and sister, I like going to Rudy's to buy ice cream and eat bbq. My favorite subject in school is recess, and most days in the summer, you'll find me at Schertz pool.

In some ways, I'm different. One of those ways happened four years ago. I was seven years old. I lived in San Angelo Texas. My life was good, except, lots of times I didn't feel good. I would get really bad headaches and sometimes I would throw up for no reason. Sometimes, I would get a funny feeling inside and I'd forget where I was. Then I would sleep for a long time. I slept a lot back then. My mom would pick me up from school and I'd fall asleep before we left the parking lot.


My mom took me to the Dr's after she saw me have one of these feelings one night. She said I had a seizure. The Dr told my mom that the symptoms I was having sounded like a tumor, but my mom wasn't worried. She said, most times it's not cancer and she didn't think I had anything to worry about.

 Later that week, I had to have two tests. An MRI to look at inside my brain and an EEG to see what kind of waves my brain had. The EEG was easy. They put wires on my head with gel and I just had to lie still. My mom says I even fell asleep. The MRI was scary. I had to get a needle in my arm to let the techs see inside my brain. I was scared, but my mom prayed with me and held my hand. I remember the nurse was kidding with me and told me how brave I was, even when I cried. I had to lay in a closed machine and not move. My mom said to pretend it was a space ship. The machine made loud noises and I was cold. My mom stayed with me the whole time. When the jokey nurse came back in, my mom said she had tears in her eyes. That's how she knew something was wrong. After the MRI, we went to burger king and I came home and slept all day.

The next Monday, my mom let me and my brother walk to school alone for the first time. It was fun.


Then later that morning, I got called down to the office. I saw my brother and he told me he was called down too. We thought our house had a fire. We walked into the office and i was confused. My dad was there and my mom looked sad. She asked me if i remember that the MRI was to see if there were any weird lumps in my brain. I said yes. My mom said that there was a lump in my brain and it was called cancer. I didn't think anything at first. Then my mom said I would need surgery. That's when I got scared and started to cry. We went home and I got ready for surgery. I had to go up to Dallas and see lots of Dr.s. We stayed at the Ronald McDonald house and i got to eat at the purple cow. My mom cried a lot during those days.


Our church prayed over us and my school bought a huge teddy bear and gave it hugs and sent it to the hospital with me. I was scared but going to school and seeing my friends made me feel better.

I had surgery on a Friday. We woke up really early while it was still dark and drove to the hospital to get ready. It was raining. Soon, I was on my way to the operating room. When I woke up, my mom was there. She told me that they got the whole tumor and that I'd be fine. I had a small headache and my tongue hurt from the tube in my throat. I had a big scar in the back of my head that my mom called my trap door. I went home from the hospital two days later. We stayed in the Ronald McDonald house a few more days. The Drs said i was better and we drove back home to san Angelo. I went back to school a week later and started having MRIs sometimes to make sure the tumor stayed gone. It's been four years yesterday and the tumor hasn't come back.

The first time I heard about Relay for Life, we were in Biloxi Mississippi. My mom said that Relay For Life was an all night walk to help raise awareness and money for cancer research and that it would be a good thing to do. There would be other survivors like me and walking with them would make me feel like I was part of a really big family. The survivor lap was cool, but a little sad. I didn't know that there were so many people with cancer. I thought I was the only one. I was scared to walk the lap all by myself, but this nice lady named Lynn, who had breast cancer, walked with me and held my hand. My mom made friends with her that night and she'd give me hugs whenever she saw me after that. I love going to relay for Life. It's really neat to be around so many people who care about you. It's like they are cheering you on for surviving. There's one part that makes my mom cry every year. It's called the Lumiaria part. You can buy a bag and decorate it to be in honor or in memory of someone with cancer. When it gets dark, all the bags are lit with candles. My mom says that it's amazing seeing all those bags lit up. I'm looking forward to relay this year. It's on April 27th. This year, I'm big enough to walk all night. We're bringing our camper and we're going to stay for the whole thing. I've already raised some money and I'm happy to be a hero of hope this year.

The funny thing is, I don't think of me as being a hero. I'm just a normal kid like everyone else. I'm just a normal kid who is also a cancer survivor. I plan on surviving for a very long time.

Benji is fifteen now, and by the grace of God, continues to be cancer free. What has amazed me the most about this expereince, is how many children there are with brain tumors and other forms of cancer. It breaks my heart.