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I made the cover of the Duluth Reader, pictured to the right. The art was a collaboration of work done by Todd Olson, Bruce Woodman, and Hippie Dick from Duluth.
How do you feel about life as a whole? Do
you cherish each and every moment in life?
Most people don’t ever think that they could
lose it all. I would like to share experiences
in my life that opened my eyes and made me
cherish each moment of my life.
In December of 1989, when I was 10, my
sight began to disappear. Playing games on
the computer was my favorite pastime. All of
a sudden it was really hard for me to keep up
with the speed of games. I found myself only
a few inches from the computer screen.
My parents knew there was something
wrong, and so they took me in to an eye
specialist. He said I had optic nerve damage.
An MRI confirmed that I had a brain tumor
growing between my optic nerve and
pituitary gland. The tumor showed up on the
computer after I was injected with a dye to
enhance abnormal cells. I had five doctors
helping in my treatment.
Located in the middle of my head, the
tumor was inoperable. We decided to treat it
with radiation first and see how it would
react to treatment. Luckily for me, it soon
shrank. I went through 29 radiation
treatments with many blood tests in between
treatments. This was necessary to check my
white blood cell count because radiation kills
good cells besides the bad. The worst part
was the side effects of the treatment;
sickness. It is like having a bad flu. Your
energy level drops to nearly nothing. I lost a
lot of weight because I couldn’t keep most
foods down. I felt really sick most of the
time. It took three months to get through
treatment, but it seemed to go on forever.
Sometimes I felt sick, like there was a fire
inside of me. The worst experience was
when my hair fell out. I was only in fourth
grade. I didn’t know how the other kids in my
class would react to it. Would they laugh at
me? My teacher let my wear a hat. One day at
recess while I was playing the cap blew off. It
wasn’t bad at all. The kids didn’t seem to
mind. My teacher saw it happen. When
everyone was back inside she explained to
the kids why I was bald. This made me feel
better, and I even stopped wearing the cap
around school. But I did wear it outside so
my head wouldn’t get sunburned.
Since then I have also had a
thyroidectomy when I found I had thyroid
cancer. This was caused by my radiation as
a little kid years ago. This was unexpected
so it has been a difficult year. I have also
had another brain tumor surgically removed.
This tumor was not detected till I had a
seizure occur. My health is now secure
again. Yet, this was another unexpected
incident in my life. During my recovery,
doctors recommended that I take it down a
few notches, so I then looked for living
options here in Duluth.
I have now been here for approximately
ten years and have been focusing on my
therapeutic art.
Reflecting back on these unsure years I feel
numb to all of the medical pokes, picks,
scans, and procedures. I do feel there is
many things I may have missed out on in my
younger years but it is what pushes me on to
new challenges in life that continue to send
me in different directions.
My family and friends have always
supported me through out my life.
I was baptized into a Lutheran Church
before I can even remember. Growing up this
always was an important time of my life.
After high school and into college I found a
couple of extra groups like Campus Crusade,
and other Ministry groups that kept God in
my life.
Cancer has affected many parts of my life.
First it has left me with limited eyesight, and I
must take replacement drugs for hormones
produced in my non-functioning pituitary
gland for the rest of my life.
Second, Cancer has taught me to be
compassionate, to help others, to enjoy life,
and live each day to its fullest. You never
know what could happen to you. No one
believes it could happen to them, but it can,
and does happen to many.
Third, I learned the value of family as my
ongoing strength throughout this entire
ordeal. They were always there to comfort
me and cheer me up. All of them really kept
my hopes up. There were times when I felt
like giving up, but then I would think of how
it would hurt them and their pain kept me
going.
A fourth positive to come from my
experiences was origami. A year prior to my
illness I was introduced to origami paper
folding by a Japanese foreign exchange
student who was staying with some friends.
Somehow he heard that I was ill and sent me
one thousand paper cranes as a get well gift.
Senbazuru, as they are called in Japan, look
amazing all strung together by needle and
thread. The cranes hang in a three foot long
arrangement. It is so colorful and cheerful.
When I received them in the mail I just had to
learn how to make some origami objects, so I
got a book and started to fold. Once I learned
one thing I went on to another item. Pretty
soon I knew several different objects and
gave me something to do with my time.
I still spend a lot of time folding origami
and have even made a small business.
Teaching people the art of origami gives me
much satisfaction. I love to share this
amazing art with everyone. Yes, it is still on
my bucket list to travel to Japan and learn
about their culture.
On Saturday May 21st
I had a stroke while I was sleeping that night.
When I woke up the next morning I had
paralysis on my left side; I had slurred
speech, and no strength at all on my left
side. I then went directly to the ER. After
many tests the following days I was told that
I had a rare brain bleed called a Hemorrhagic
Stroke. After a week or so in the hospital I
was moved directly over to the rehab center
where I started to work hard to gain strength
and cognitive traits back. This was a lot of
hard work but I found out that I needed to
look at it week by week, instead of day by
day. This was quite an emotional roller
coaster for myself, my family, and my
friends; but most importantly God helped me
keep going. After 45 days I got out of rehab
and was able to move back into my
apartment.
Now, I will be going down to the University of
Minnesota to have my case looked at by a
neurosurgeon. Hopefully, I will find out what
my next steps will be.
In October 2021, they were doing CT scans
on my esophagus checking the size of a growth
along my esophagi\us; and sure enough it had
gotten bigger, so it had to be removed; so Dr.
Tummala who dealt with my stoke stuff referred
me to an ear nose and throat specialist. She was
very nice and totally spoke our families’ language
so we understood her diagnosis.
Once she got into the surgery, she said it would
take at least 4 hours, but when she got in there it
took an extra 2 hours. On this growth was a vine-
like tumor that ran all the way up to my
cerebellum and she had to cut a nerve. She had to
remove 16 polyps, one of which had thyroid
cancer in it. I had a thyroidectomy back in my
20’s, so this was part of that and was unknown to
me. She removed it, so now I have been cancer
free for 4 months.
Anybody, regardless of age, sex, race,
creed or religion can get cancer. However,
medical advancements have given most
cancer patients hope for complete recovery.
My prognosis is for a long and healthy life.
My ophthalmologist is hopeful that optic
nerves will be able to be repaired sometime
during my life. Perhaps I will gain my sight
back. I no longer care if I regain my sight
because I have learned to live with it. We
must take what life has given us and make
the best of it. Life is a challenge, but you
must cherish it.
Peace,
Todd Olson
I hope my story does inspire other people in
their lives. I also really do enjoy hearing
about other inspirational stories so please
feel free to share them. They always
encourage me to go forward- Life Does Not
End Here-
Todd was featured on KBJR NBC News, which you can find here.