I have gone through it — you know, the losing of my hair, losing my fingernails, my toenails, my breasts. I was diagnosed with stage 4 breast cancer on July 28, 2008. That date is when everything changed. It kept playing in my head: I have cancer, I have cancer, I have cancer. My concern…
St. Xavier High School quarterback Jack Sivori can’t pinpoint the day he injured his shoulder. But as the 2019 football season progressed, throwing became more and more painful. “I couldn’t throw as hard, and I started throwing weird because of the pain,” the 17-year-old junior said. “I would put my arm over my head and…
Soccer is a big part of Gregory “Trey” Murphy’s life. Trey is a goalie, and he plays on both a high school team and a travel team. Soccer came to a sudden and painful halt for Trey in March 2019. In warmups, Trey went to step one way but his leg got caught under him,…
Riding his bike on a trail, Dan Lillpop tried to turn around in tall grass. The bike stopped and Dan fell. The 65-year-old braced himself with his left arm, tearing the rotator cuff in his shoulder when he hit the ground. After a trip to the emergency room, X-rays, and a magnetic resonance imaging (MRI)…
On the track at Churchill Downs is where Hall of Fame horse trainer D. Wayne Lukas spends most of his time. You’ll find him there seven days a week. The word vacation is foreign to Wayne. He doesn’t slow down. His alarm goes off every morning at 3:30 a.m. Then, once on the track —…
Lee Dulaney did her best to ignore the pain in her right hip for years. Steroid injections helped, but the pain persisted. “I’d get steroid injections, and it would feel better for a while; and then the pain would come back.” Lee said. “People would say, ‘You’re limping,’ and I’d say, ‘I know. It hurts.’”…
During his 30-year coaching career at the University of Louisville, legendary Basketball Hall of Famer Denny Crum was prepared for the toughest matchups on the court. Off the court, two strokes in two years not only caught him off guard but proved to be a formidable opponent. Now, one year after his debilitating second stroke,…
When Emily Carr began experiencing a baffling array of symptoms — pain when she stood up, dizziness when she leaned over, severe migraines and memory loss — she thought it could be a brain tumor. A trip to her primary care doctor and then an ear, nose and throat specialist didn’t bring a diagnosis. Six…
With COVID-19 weakening her body, Hannah Jones, 24, was at risk of a heart attack. She was placed on a ventilator so she could breathe. It was very possible she would die. Two days after getting an infusion of plasma donated by a COVID-19 survivor, she was out of intensive care and on the road…
Louisville sports journalist Jody Demling doesn’t remember his parish priest, the Rev. William M. Bowling, administering the sacrament of anointing the sick. He can’t remember the nightly phone calls from his wife and children. Many of the health care providers who tended to him when no one else could are a blur. He will never…
David and Mary Newton haven’t spent more than a few days apart since they were married 47 years ago in Loretta, Kentucky. As their anniversary approached, Mary was recovering from surgery at Norton Hospital. Visitor restrictions required by the coronavirus pandemic meant David could not be by her side. “It was pretty hard,” Mary said,…
Maureen Loftus, R.N., saw her childhood neighbor lying in the intensive care unit (ICU). His eyes were closed. A ventilator helped him with the breath that COVID-19 had taken away. He was alone in the room. “I honestly think that might have been one of the only times I had seen him without his wife…