A year ago they prayed for her as she faced one of the biggest challenges of her young life. And last week members of the congregation at St. Peter’s Ecumenical Church in Slave Lake celebrated the determination and tenacity that has made Kristen Roth a cancer survivor -- one year later.
In February of 2003, doctors first delivered the numbing news to then-23-year old Kristen and her parents Dianne and Dennis that Kristen had leukemia, she told the congregation last Sunday morning.
“I had chemotherapy and lost my hair,” she said, “and the doctors gave me strong antibiotics.”
As tough as that round of meds was on her system, Kristen said she also received constant reminders that friends back home were pulling for her and entire congregations were offering prayers for her recovery.
“I had lots of friends and family come to visit me,” she recalled. “I wasn’t allowed to have flowers, so I got lots and lots of teddy bears, about 50 or more.” In fact there were so many “we had to hang them from the ceiling so they wouldn’t be in the way for the nurses.”
It was those stuffed toys that provided at least one bright moment for the family, said Kristen, even if it was at her mom Dianne’s expense.
“I was always telling Mom what I wanted, and one day when Reese Boisvert (a four-year-old friend of the family) was visiting, I was telling mom ‘Duck down’. She ducked down,” feigning a hide and seek game behind the bed.
“I called ‘Duck down” again, (and) again Mom ducked down. “What I meant was to get the duck down that was hanging on the ceiling,” said Kristen said with a giggle, pulling a bright yellow stuffed duck from her sports bag.
(Mom Dianne’s diary also reveals that the very good times also included a private concert from Kristen’s favourite country star Adam Gregory who showed up when Kristen was visiting with family members in Edmonton, then visited her regularly in hospital.)
But the humourous days, she was quick to add, were more the exception than the rule for the family that had begun to count every day together as a blessing, even though they realized they weren’t alone in their tough times.
“I met two good friends in the Edmonton (University of Alberta) hospital, Paulette and Sonya. They both had leukemia like me.”
“I stayed in hospital” to recover following the chemotherapy, she recalled, “then I went to Calgary (in July) for a bone marrow transplant.”
But that was not as simple or straightforward as they’d hoped, and the roller coaster that they would soon begin to recognize as the norm, began to buck and pitch again.
“Lots of things went wrong, and my transplant was not to be, so we went home.”
Months later, in November of that year, their roller coaster took another heart-stopping plunge when monthly tests revealed that Kristen’s leukemia, in abeyance for a short while, had returned. That prompted more stressful waiting, and another round of twice-weekly blood tests to tell doctors she was ready for the next round of chemotherapy treatments.
After being able to celebrate her favourite day of the year – Christmas — at home, “I went back in to the hospital in Edmonton (in January) and had more chemotherapy.”
But with her immune system destroyed by the chemo, she developed an infection in her CVC (central venous catheter) line, leaving doctors with no choice but to remove it.
By March doctors decided Kristen would soon be ready to attempt the bone marrow transplant route again, and shuttled her back to Calgary.
A cold would delay the procedure, “but it also gave Kristen the chance to be an honourary bridesmaid for a long-time Slave Lake friend, Charla Green, who was getting married in Calgary” at the time, said family friend Brenda Eben-Ebenau. (“It was fun helping Beatrice Reid pack up all the right clothes, the socks and suits for everyone to be sent along to Calgary with friends,” Eben-Ebenau recalls with a laugh.)
Back at the Tom Baker Centre of Calgary’s Foothills hospital, “the doctor gave me more chemotherapy, and other medicine” to kill off all the infection-fighting white blood cells in preparation for the transplant.
“They gave me anaesthesia so I could have total body irradiation (TBI),” she said, but again fate that had already dealt so many blows to the family, stepped in.
“I had a (rare) reaction to the anaesthesia, and my blood started to cook. (It was later characterized as ‘malignant hypothermia’ by doctors who were stunned, and admitted they’d only read about it in text books.)
“I worried everybody,” Kristen says, “and had to stay (intensive care unit) for 12 hours.”
“On Apr. 13 I had my stem cell transplant . A nurse from Blood Services came to my room with a special warming tray and my frozen donor blood cells,” she recalled.
But what should have been an exciting time for Kristen was anything but.
“I was very hard for me to lie still because I was scared,” she said.
“I just wanted to go to the bathroom and not come out for a long time.” That being impossible, she added, “I stayed in my bed because I had to.
And before she knew it, the transplant had worked its magic.
“My new stem cells were put into my CVC line and from that moment I was a new me.”
In fact, Kristen said, there was a lot more to that ‘newness’ than she realized.
“The doctor told me before I left hospital that my donor was a man and that my cells are all now male cells, and I have a new blood type.
“We are not allowed to know who the donor is until one year after the transplant, and only if the donor wants to meet me.” That said, however, “the donor wrote me a nice card, wishing me well,” as the transplant unfolded.
Post transplant would become Kristen’s longest hospital stay, extending to a full five months while doctors monitored the success of the transplant. Sadly, that was also the time when her friend Paulette – who’d had a transplant about the same time as Kristen and Sonya – succumbed to post-transplant pneumonia.
Sonya, however, had a successful transplant like Kristen, and they continue to meet with the Calgary transplant team for monthly check-ups in Edmonton.
And at the church service last week, Kristen credited the St. Peter’s congregation for its role.
“On Apr. 13 it will be one year since my transplant so we are celebrating,” she told them.
“Thank you for your prayers.”
“You are our little miracle,” replied long-time friend Heather Labrie, offering a congratulatory bouquet to Kristen and her parents.
Eben-Ebenau also invited members of the congregation to come to a celebration at the Northern Lakes College campus in Slave Lake from 2:00 to 5:00 p.m., on May 21, when the community celebrates Kristen’s 25th birthday -- and officially marks her transplant anniversary.

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