AT 18 YEARS OLD, Bradley Murray was given the worst news of his life. He had cancer.
It was devastating for the youngster who loved sports, particularly basketball. He was banking on playing for Barbados and landing a scholarship to further his dreams of becoming an electrical engineer.
“I guess I was having it all along through school. I was playing basketball . . . everything was still working the same just that during practice at BCC (Barbados Community College) I fell,” he said, as he recalled the events that led to the discovery of the tumour that changed life as he knew it in 2001.
“They thought it was a sprain, something dislocated, all sorts of things. The coach had told me they were picking the squad to go to the Bahamas, that was late November and I went on crutches to speed up the healing.
“When I went to Dr [Jerry] Thorne, a bone specialist, he ran his thumb down the bone and felt an indentation and it was very painful. When he ordered the X-ray of the leg he saw the bone as if it was being eroded or breaking down.” That was a few days ahead of his 18th birthday.
The Coleridge & Parry School old scholar, who stands at 6ft 1in tall, said everything was “fast paced” from that moment and he had to suspend his studies at BCC to travel to Toronto, Canada with his mum Sandra.
“I cried and I cried and I cried . . . . I never heard anybody living from cancer so I told myself this is it for me. I also tried to do some research and I saw nothing positive. I was scared but my mum was optimistic about what we would hear,” Bradley said.
“Dr Thorne recommended Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto where he was trained. He set up everything. The doctors did their tests and discovered it was a very aggressive cancer and it started from the knee, ran up the centre of the bone for 12 inches and it also spread into three of my quads. It was extensive,” he said with a wry smile.
Bradley, now a mathematics teacher at The Lester Vaughan School, said the medical team advised them to always ask questions and they did: “The [medical] team asked my fears and I said I expect to be 100 per cent healed when I’m done . . . . Back to how I was. My main goal was to hear that I would be running about.”
Bradley was told that with the extent of the cancer, there was no guarantee that he would keep his leg.
“When he told me so, I was crying. He asked what was more important – life or losing a leg or maybe not being able to use your leg 100 per cent? They give all of the options, the good, the bad and the in-between.
“I guess that brought it into perspective for me. I stopped crying and told them to do what they had to do to save my life and if they could get it to the point where I could keep my leg, I would take that chance.”
The medical team moved ahead and the first round of chemotherapy began in March. He described it as the “worst thing ever” but he endured the regimen. He had surgery, more chemotherapy and he went from 180 pounds to 130 pounds and suffered “a lot of ups and downs”.
He came home after spending 22 weeks in Canada but had to return to be treated for an infection. Back home again he had to learn to walk with a piece of metal inserted into his leg. He also returned to the gym to try to bulk up and he continued studying.
“I got stronger, started playing basketball and broke my leg . . . . I went for a pick and roll, the ball went in the air, I jumped for it and landed badly. . . ”.
Bradley had to do another surgery to remove everything and put back in a fresh piece of metal.
“This cancer taught me a lot about myself, how strong I am and what I’m capable of . . . . It showed me the many hurdles of life, and that we take so much for granted. The little things that we miss, friends and family, the blessings that we see and don’t even check for . . . ”.
(Green Bananas Media)
