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Topic: Dana Reeve Dies of Lung Cancer at 44
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Jason M Miller
Master Film Handler
Posts: 284
From: Kalamazoo, Michigan, USA
Registered: Jul 2004
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posted 03-08-2006 12:46 AM
From Yahoo News
quote:
Dana Reeve Dies of Lung Cancer at 44
By JIM FITZGERALD, Associated Press Writer
WHITE PLAINS, N.Y. - Dana Reeve, the singer-actress who married the strapping star of the "Superman" movies and then devoted herself to his care and his cause after he was paralyzed, has died of lung cancer, a year-and-a-half after her husband. She was 44.
Although Reeve had announced her cancer diagnosis in August — to an outpouring of sympathy and support from admirers around the world — her death seemed sudden. As recently as Jan. 12, she looked healthy and happy as she belted out Carole King's "Now and Forever" at a packed Madison Square Garden during a ceremony honoring hockey star Mark Messier, a friend.
"Unfortunately, that's what happens with this awful disease," said Maggie Goldberg of the Christopher Reeve Foundation, where Dana Reeve had succeeded her husband as chair. "You feel good, you're responding and then the downturn."
Reeve, who lived in Pound Ridge, died Monday night at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Medical Center in Manhattan, said foundation president Kathy Lewis.
Officials would not discuss Reeve's treatment or say when she entered the hospital. But Lewis said she visited her there on Friday, when Reeve was "tired but with her typical sense of humor and smile, always trying to make other people feel good, her characteristic personality."
"The brightest light has gone out," said comedian Robin Williams. "We will forever celebrate her loving spirit."
Former President Clinton and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton described Reeve as "a model of tenacity and grace."
"Despite the adversity that she faced, Dana bravely met these challenges and was always an extremely devoted wife, mother and advocate," they said.
Christopher and Dana Reeve married in 1992. Life changed drastically for the young show business couple three years later when Christopher Reeve suffered near-total paralysis in a horse-riding accident and almost died.
In his autobiography, "Still Me," Reeve wrote that he suggested early on to his wife, "Maybe we should let me go." She responded, "I'll be with you for the long haul, no matter what. You're still you and I love you."
Those were "the words that saved my life," Christopher Reeve said.
For his remaining nine years, Dana Reeve was her husband's constant companion and supporter during the ordeal of his rehabilitation, winning worldwide acclaim and admiration. With him, she became an activist in the search for a cure for spinal cord injuries.
"Something miraculous and wonderful happened amidst terrible tragedy, and a whole new dimension of life began to emerge," she wrote in a 1999 book, "Care Packages: Letters to Christopher Reeve from Strangers and Other Friends." "What we had yet to discover were all the gifts that come out of sharing hardship, the hidden pleasures behind the pain."
After her husband's death in October 2004, Reeve said she planned to return to acting. She had appeared on Broadway, off-Broadway and regional stages and on the TV shows "Law & Order," "Oz," and "All My Children" and she'd had to give up a Broadway role when she was widowed.
"I am an actress and I do have to make a living," she said.
However, her mother died of complications from ovarian cancer and her own diagnosis came the next summer, two days after the lung cancer death of ABC News anchor Peter Jennings, a smoker.
"I thought that after everything that she had gone through with Chris that she would have time to smell the flowers and be in the sun," said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (news, bio, voting record) of California. "But apparently that was not meant to be."
From the start, Reeve, a nonsmoker, expressed confidence she would beat lung cancer. And four months ago, wearing a long formal gown at a fundraising gala for the foundation, Reeve provoked wolf whistles from Williams and said she was responding well to treatment.
"I'm beating the odds and defying every statistic the doctors can throw at me," Reeve said. "My prognosis looks better all the time."
At about the same time, Reeve taped a PBS show, "The New Medicine," about how doctors are paying more attention to a patient's cultural values and lifestyle as part of treatment. In her introduction to the program, Reeve said, "It has become clear to me that high-tech medicine, with all its wonders, often leaves out that all-important human touch."
PBS said Tuesday that the show will be broadcast as scheduled March 29.
Survivors include the Reeves' 13-year-old son, Will; two grown stepchildren, Matthew and Alexandra; her father, Charles Morosini; and two sisters.
Goldberg said Will was "in the loving care of family and friends" and that his mother had arranged for his future.
The foundation said no plans for a funeral have been announced.
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Leo Enticknap
Film God
Posts: 7474
From: Loma Linda, CA
Registered: Jul 2000
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posted 03-08-2006 11:42 AM
That issue prompted this story. Perhaps the reason why the obituary coverage continually stressed that Dana Reeve didn't smoke was because of a perceived stigma that most sufferers of lung cancer are smokers, and therefore (so the stereotype goes) are getting what they deserve.
quote: Bobby Henderson
Many doctors have said the disease is paricularly dangerous because lots of patients don't get treatment until they realize they have any symptoms.
That applies to most forms of cancer, from what I understand. Interestingly, however (I can only speak for Britain here, obviously) government organised preventative screening programmes exist for many other form of cancer, e.g. breast and ovarian, but not lung cancer. Perhaps the 'lung cancer = smoker = serves 'em right' preconception could be partly behind that?
In this case, however, it's hard to think of anyone who 'deserved' any serious disease less than Reeve, who had devoted the previous decade to looking after her paralysed husband and bringing up a child virtually single-handed. OK, she probably didn't have any money worries, but apart from that she seems to have been on the receiving end of every conceivable form of bad luck during the last decade of her life.
A significant number of teetotallers suffer from cirrhosis of the liver, too; vegetarian health food enthusiasts regularly suffer heart attacks; and occasionally, AIDS is passed by blood transfusions.
That having been said, only the flat earth merchants are likely to deny that tobacco smoke causes lung cancer, even if it's not the only thing which causes lung cancer. But in this instance, the obituary writers probably took the decision that coverage of Mrs. Reeve's death is not the most appropriate forum for an anti-smoking message: if so, it's one I broadly agree with.
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Bobby Henderson
"Ask me about Trajan."
Posts: 10973
From: Lawton, OK, USA
Registered: Apr 2001
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posted 03-08-2006 01:01 PM
quote: Leo Enticknap
Interestingly, however (I can only speak for Britain here, obviously) government organised preventative screening programmes exist for many other form of cancer, e.g. breast and ovarian, but not lung cancer. Perhaps the 'lung cancer = smoker = serves 'em right' preconception could be partly behind that?
Preventative Health Care in the United States? Nope. There isn't any profit in it. Hospital corporations and drug company giants make a lot more money from people falling seriously ill. Those businesses can gouge cancer patients for more than $100,000 per year on cancer treatments. Cha-ching!!
I don't think the typical American has any attitude that a smoker is somehow getting a deserved punishment from contracting cancer. Just about any of us has a family member or friend who was striken or even killed by the disease. So the news of Dana Reeve's death resonates so strongly because it brings up a lot of painful, personal experiences for millions of Americans.
My mother's father died painfully from lung cancer. He had his left lung removed. It was awful. I was only 10 years old at the time. He was a smoker -even rolled his own cigarettes, old school style. The way he died was so awful both my parents quit smoking cold turkey. My brother and I never started, largely over the memories of that experience.
However, Leo, you are correct about a nasty attitude problem simmering in the public about cigarette smoking in general. The general public knows it is a dangerous habit and the high cost of treatment and deaths that result from it are preventable. So they see the act of smoking as irresponsible behavior. Middle aged or older people grew up in a time where cigarette use was very glamourized and not much health information was available. I think they deserve at least some slack. Younger people know better but they're smoking anyway. Some see it as an act of defiance. Unfortunately, defiance in any form is also often seen as a trait of being cool.
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