Good Samaritan helps breast cancer patient in crisis
Published: March 16, 2006
Six days after thieves stole Barley Parrish’s last-ditch effort to stave off advanced breast cancer, the single mother had nearly given up hope that the $5,000 “light-beam generator” would turn up.
Friends put up fliers and searched the West Sacramento neighborhood around Yolo High School, where Parrish works as a counselor. Colleagues collected $500 for a no-questions-asked reward if the machine were returned. But nothing was found.
Then, after a TV newscast highlighted Parrish’s plight Wednesday evening, an Elverta man donated $5,000 for another machine that Parrish said uses low-intensity light beams to dissolve the tumors that have spread to her liver, lungs and lymph nodes.
“I can’t believe it. I’m still in shock,” she said Wednesday night after ordering another machine from the Illinois company. “I’m on my way. I just told the people to rush it and put in the mail so I can be pain-free this weekend. I’m so happy.”
Jonny Davis, who rarely watches the 5 p.m. news, nearly failed to connect with Parrish.
“I just happened to glance at the TV and saw this person in distress and in need of help,” said Davis, who is retired. “The clock is ticking, and this is something she needs now. I just said, ‘This person needs help right now,’ and I’m going to do it, whatever it is, I don’t care.”
Davis, 60, met Parrish, 46, for the first time Wednesday night and presented her with a $5,000 check. Davis said he is not a wealthy man and the donation will be tough to manage, but he realized Parrish has few options.
With her body growing resistant to chemotherapy, Parrish had became desperate for a way to extend her life and spend more time with her first-grade son, Corey, 6. Parrish said she heard the machine had produced positive results for some people and she decided to try the unproven therapy out of desperation.
“I have to be there for my son; so I’m pretty much open to try any and everything,” she said, choking back sobs. “I’m just trying to be there for him.”
Parrish was excited when she picked up the original machine at the West Sacramento UPS office last week. After work, she planned to place the machine’s twin heads under her arms and on her liver, beginning a regimen of low-intensity light treatment while she slept.
But first Parrish had to return to work. She left the large box containing the machine in the back seat of her vehicle, where thieves broke in and stole it.
“My concern is whoever stole it may say, ‘What the heck is this kooky thing,’ and my concern as well as everyone else’s concern is that they will just toss it,” Parrish said.
Since the theft, Parrish’s friends, colleagues and students rallied around her, scouring the area for any sign of the machine in trash bins, in the school’s community garden - even on the roofs of the campus’s buildings. They turned up no tips, despite a $500 reward.
Gary Saldutti, Yolo High’s P.E. teacher, searched eBay’s used electronics pages with no luck.
“Here she is helping kids in a job that not a lot of people would do, with not a lot of rewards, because it’s a tough crowd as they say,” he said. “We’re going to make sure she’s taken care of. This is such a wonderful woman.”
School officials organized an assembly Monday to inform students that Parrish has late-stage breast cancer and that one of her final treatment options had been stolen. The auditorium was silent as the normally rambunctious continuation school students took in the news.
“Her role here is beyond the normal counselor’s role because she really has to reach out to kids,” said Mark McVicar, campus supervisor.
Watching the TV broadcast, Davis felt an immediate connection to Parrish, although the two had never met. Like Parrish, Davis received a surprise cancer diagnosis a few years ago and had to have a 1-inch piece of his lower lip removed.
Davis knows battling cancer is a terrifying experience.
“You have no control,” he said. “You can’t fight back. You just don’t know. You’re in for the ride.”
When Parrish was diagnosed with end-stage, metastasized breast cancer in 2002, doctors told her most people in similar circumstances lived 18 months and that 20 percent lived five years.
Parrish hopes the light-beam generator will help her see winter blossom into spring in 2007 and mark the fifth anniversary of her cancer diagnosis.
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