Writing his way through tough times

[darrels joy]

Writing his way through tough times
By CHHUN SUN
YAKIMA HERALD-REPUBLIC


Oscar Valero was self-reliant ? maybe even a little cocky, some might've said.

But when the ex-Marine ran head-on into his own mortality three years ago, he changed his ways.

The humbling transformation taught the 1980 Prosser High School graduate to fight through fear, to believe in the power of prayer and to lean on loved ones in tough times.

It also convinced him to write a book, which has just been released by an Oklahoma publisher.

"When we hear the word 'cancer,' thousands of words and thoughts come to mind," Valero said in an interview. "How do you deal with it? What does it all mean? There's so much information in the short period of time you have to learn about the cancer. It's all overwhelming."

In August 2002, a doctor discovered Valero had signet ring, a gastric cancer that was invading his stomach and making its way into his organs, deteriorating the junction between the top of the stomach and bottom of the esophagus.

Today, the 43-year-old Valero is a new person, turning the thousands of thoughts and questions he had into "Living the Fear," a 134-page guidebook reflecting on the challenges of living with cancer. He insists the book is not just for people who have survived serious diseases ? it's an instructional manual for people going through tough times, offering concepts, words and philosophy.

Before the cancer, Valero, who now lives in Pasco, said he was living a "normal life."

Nothing too out of the ordinary, he said.

But on June 6, 2002, his doctor, Enriquez Carter in the Tri-Cities, found ulcers in Valero's stomach.

Then on the morning of Aug. 2, 2002, Valero drank his orange juice and started having "sharp, sudden pain" in his stomach. He went to see his doctor to locate the source of the pain. Three days later, his doctor diagnosed him with the stomach cancer, which was at the stage where it started to destroy his insides. Luckily, the doctor found the cancer before it hit the next stage, where it would've invaded his organs and been out of doctors' reach.

Valero had surgery at the Virginia Mason hospital in Seattle, where two-thirds of his stomach and half of his esophagus was removed.

After months of radiation therapy and chemotherapy at the Tri-Cities Cancer Center, the treatments ended in mid-December 2002.

Before the cancer, Valero was 186 pounds and in good physical shape, lifting weights and running daily. Because of the surgeries and treatments, he lost almost 50 pounds; he sometimes had to ask his family for help getting out of bed and even taking showers.

"He was so weak," his wife, Dora, remembers. "It was a huge ordeal to sit on a recliner and it would take him 10 minutes to get up from his bed and walk 50 feet to the recliner and sit."

Dora noticed that after the sugeries, Oscar starting feeling confused and started isolating himself from everyone.

"He couldn't talk to anybody about the experience," she said. "I told him, 'If you journalize your feelings and thoughts, it can help you get them out.'"

So, in late December, he started jotting down notes. The notes began to form a manuscript.

In September 2003, he submitted his manuscript to two book publishing companies. One of them was Tate Publishing & Enterprises.

Six weeks later, the Mustang, Okla.-based company called Valero.

"I was excited, I was thrilled," he recalls. "It was a sense of relief, knowing my words can help people go through the trauma I went to."

"Living the Fear" mostly chronicles the time when he first realized he had cancer to learning to live with the cancer.

"We are excited about 'Living the Fear' and want to introduce it to as many market venues as possible right away," Rita Tate, marketing director for Tate Publishing, said in a press release. "We believe the book will cross several genres, including Christian and secular markets."

In the book, Valero writes, "This book is intended to appeal to the subjective and judgmental natures of man and at the same time inspire and perhaps provide a glimmer of hope and direction. It is based on an actual account, a true testimony."

He has been cancer-free for three years now, but doctors won't consider him an official cancer survivor for two more years. Even after the fifth year of survival, he said, the cancer has an 18 percent morality rate.

But he doesn't let that stop him from living.

"Don't allow your past to become your future," he says, reiterating one of the messages in the book.


* Oscar Valero's book, "Living the Fear," is available through Oklahoma-based Tate Publishing & Enterprises. The Web site is www.tatepublishing.com.


n Reporter Chhun Sun can be reached by phone at 577-7630, or by e-mail at csun@yakima-herald.com.