My husband has a friend from high school, Sean, who is a real life hero.
9 years ago Sean was diagnosed with melanoma, skin cancer, on his back/shoulder. He had it removed and went through chemo and more or less beat it. He was 21 at the time. Shortly after that, I’m not really sure of when, he was diagnosed with prostate cancer. He went through treatments and beat that as well. I first met him when he was 26. Even before I knew that he’d beaten cancer twice, I was absolutely amazed at how full of life and how positive this guy was.
Sean worked for years with special needs kids. That in itself requires a very special person and personality. Sean was the epitome of this person. He just seemed always happy and it was pretty well contagious. He was larger than life every time I saw him. He always seemed on top of the world. There was always something positive in every situation.
He met and married a wonderful companion for him, Amy. She is just as high on life as Sean is. I love watching the two together because they are always joking and give a good feeling just being around them. They’re always laughing, always smiling. She had a 5 or 6 year old son at the time from a previous marriage and once Sean and Amy were married, Sean was proud to call her son his.
Within a year of meeting him, his doctors discovered a growth on his lung. I believe this is around the time that Sean was able to receive a priesthood blessing from one of the general authorities. It was decided that the doctors needed to perform surgery and look at, and possibly remove, the growth. Once they got in, they could not find anything. There was no growth, no abnormalities. They couldn’t explain it. I believe it was the miracle healing power of the priesthood, but that is me.
Sean joined the police acadamey, he started out in dispatch but what he really wanted was to be an officer and so that was going to be his goal. Nothing could bring him down. He began training, but shortly after beginning training he started having migraines that just wouldn’t ease up.
Finally, the migraines got so bad that Sean went to the hospital and what they discovered were many, many tumors in his brain. There was one specifically causing the migraines. When they took it out they discovered it was the size of a racket ball. Within only a couple of days Sean was doing so well that he was back home to finish recovering.
Sean continued to go through the police acadamey and to train. He got into the best shape of his life, running 5+ miles a day, up hill. He had muscles built and looked so healthy and wonderful. He graduated from the acadamey and became an officer. But within months of having his first brain surgery he had to go in for a 2nd surgery to remove some more tumors. That was difficult for him but he pulled through. He was going through radiation therapy and fighting to beat this cancer like all the other times. Within a few months of that surgery he had to have a 3rd surgery and more aggressive treatments. Sean was fighting with all he had to beat this, and still he seemed to be more positive about life than myself, with no problems close to cancer.
It was also discovered that Sean has 2 tumors on his spine. One, towards the bottom of the spine, has atrophied one of his legs. The other is farther up on his spine. It seems like no matter how hard Sean fights, the cancer is stronger and won’t leave him be.
One night Sean had multiple grand mal seizures. One of the seizures he quit breathing for at least 6 minutes. Amy was terrified and said he was totally blue. When that seizure stopped Sean did not know who he was. He didn’t know who Amy was and he was fighting her because he was so freaked out. She couldn’t leave him to go get the phone because he kept trying to walk through a big mirror they have in their bedroom. Eventually she was able to get the phone. The ambulance was busy with a “real emergency” and didn’t have time to come get “the seizure guy.” Amy’s dad came to help but Sean was fighting and didn’t want to get in the car. Can’t say that I blame him, he still didn’t know who he was or who these people were. Her dad then said, “Officer Sivertsen, get in the car!” and Sean immediately quit fighting, walked over to the car and got into the back seat so they could drive him to the hospital, where he had his 5th or 6th seizure.
Sean has gone downhill recently. He requested not to be taken to the hospital, but to just be allowed to die at home. Sean is finished fighting. I certainly do not blame him. Kevin and I drove down late at night to see him because Amy was afraid he might not make it through the night. I was heartbroken to see him so sick. He was so frail, he was like a bag of bones. He hardly had the energy to talk and his logic was not very logical. He was hallucinating. He got to meet our little boy for the first time.
Despite all of this, Amy and Sean found the good in things. Even though Sean was hallucinating, he said some things that really touched Amy and she shared them with us with a smile and even some laughing and joking. These two are amazing.
I am so grateful for the gospel and that Sean and Amy were sealed in the temple. Amy says she knows that Sean has a big job to do in heaven, and even though she doesn’t want to be left alone, she knows she’ll see him again and that he is going home. She knows death is not the end. She knows that families can truly be together forever.
Sean did make it through the night, Amy says she will call us if his condition changes. As much as I want him to stick around for Amy’s sake, I hope that he will go when he’s ready. I am so blessed to have known him and gotten to spend time with him. He has been such an inspiration and the world will feel a great loss when he’s gone, but he needs to go home and have a body as healthy as his attitude and that matches his outlook on the world.
