After my second Keytruda infusion for malignant melanoma of my dominant right thumb, for which I underwent partial amputation and sentinel node biopsy of my axilla, I continued to have time for physical, emotional, and spiritual recovery. As I began to focus on returning to more normal activities of daily life, I was determined to keep more balance in my life moving forward.

Physical Recovery

It had been just about 6 weeks since my operation. I continued to read voraciously and spend time in prayer. Kellee and I closed on our new home, a downsize, and began preparations to move, with the help of Damon Martin, who owns Martin Delivery Company and who also has quite the testimony to share. We enjoyed discussing how adversity in both of our lives made our faith stronger. If you ask him why he wears a big wooden cross around his neck, he will be glad to share it with you. We are both mutual friends of Pastor Jack Foster, who officiated Damon’s wedding ceremony. I was able to get back on the Peloton first, followed by my road bike. For my second trip out on the road bike, I was joined by my nephew, Charles West. Charles was training for a Sprint triathlon at the time and was back in Nashville for the weekend. He had traveled from Atlanta, GA, where he lives and works in equity research for an investment bank. He has since completed his triathlon, and we rode on a brisk pace for 11.3 miles on a beautiful afternoon ride. Kellee and I continued to spend a lot of time with family, namely son Gray, his fiancée Molly, daughter Alex, son-in-law Brad, grandson Bradley, grandson Jack, and all the great grandparents of Bradley and Jack: “Pops,” “Mommy Gayle,” “Choochoo,” “Niffy,” and “Gaga.” 

Little victories continued to bring me joy. It was very emotional for me to return in person to worship at Brook Hollow Baptist Church. I was moved to tears as Chandler Nicole Sherrill, with her sweet smile, led us in our first song. I enjoyed a return to “Friday Night Lights” at Montgomery Bell Academy, where I played football (Class of 1983). Tommy Owen field always brings back great memories where I watched so many family members play, including my son Gray (Class of 2013), son-in-law Brad Bars (Class of 2010), his brothers, Blake (Class of 2012) and Alex (Class of 2014), and my nephew Charles West (Class of 2016). I also appreciated my time spent with Jennifer Brantley, a cancer survivor, who helped me set up this blog you are reading.

Spiritual Recovery

I continued to experience peace as I focused on more heavenly issues. Unexpectedly, I received a call from Dr. Bill Sherman, one of my former pastors at Woodmont Baptist Church. I have always loved him, and we have always had much in common. We are both graduates of Baylor University, and he played varsity football there. As a matter of fact, he was an all-Southwest Conference safety for Baylor three years in a row and played in the 1953 Orange Bowl. When the storied New York Giants football franchise (where my son-in-law Brad played for 2 years) invited Dr. Sherman to come play pro football, he sent them a letter stating, “Thanks for the offer, but God called me to preach!” before heading off to the seminary. Dr. Sherman and I both love the Baylor Bears! He is a gentle giant, a man of God, and I listened to his sermons for years. His entire family has always been so close to our family, and multiple family members have battled melanoma over the years. I was so happy to hear his voice, and I explained over the phone to Dr. Sherman how the diagnosis of cancer had changed my life and my relationship with God. He responded with a simple but profound statement: “Lee, sometimes we do not realize that all we need is Jesus until all we have is Jesus!” That statement to date seemed to be a recapitulation of my battle with cancer up until now.

“It is good to wait quietly for the salvation of the Lord.” (Lamentations 3:26 NIV)

Author Larry Crabb, in his book Waiting for Heaven, states, “Perhaps in this verse there is no clearer statement of the Lord’s desire that we are to wait in difficult circumstances without yielding to the temptation to prioritize making a hard life easier.” Crabb, like me, came to this realization sitting in a hospital infusion ward with chemotherapy dripping into his veins. This verse in Lamentations was written by the prophet Jeremiah, who was trying to encourage the Israelites after their nation had been crushed and forced into Babylonian exile. Jeremiah himself was no stranger to intense suffering. He was mocked by fellow villagers when he was called by God, was forbidden to marry, was beaten, was forced into hiding during the reign in Judah of King Jehoiakim, was kept in a prison, and eventually carried away to Egypt.

I will leave you with these words by Crabb, reflecting on another Old Testament character, Moses, who left a life of luxury in the court of the Pharoah of Egypt, to remain faithful to God. Crabb states,” The path to happiness, to the joy and hope-filled well-being of a Christian’s soul, leads BOTH through some level of affliction, weariness, and angst, sometimes to nearly unbearable levels, AND to the awareness of a deep thirst that will be fully satisfied only in the next life, a thirst that stirs joyful, persevering hope.”

Next up…my third infusion and how I made my “comeback” to work, both to the office and to the operating room…from surgeon to patient to surgeon again!

Just 3 weeks after my first Keytruda infusion for malignant melanoma, it was already time for my second one. It went flawlessly, and again I developed some flu-like symptoms for a couple of days followed by 7-10 days of fatigue and muscle aches.

Going Public:

The Sunday after my first infusion, I decided to go public with my cancer diagnosis. Our office has been in the middle Tennessee community since 1973. I had cared for many patients over 23 years and performed literally thousands of operations. Our office, Allergy and ENT Associates of Middle Tennessee, was telling our patients that I was out on “medical leave.” The unknown of that statement left many patients seeking more information. Over the years, I had cared for generations of families, treating them as if they were my own. I have prayed with them, shed tears of joy and sadness with them, walked them through cancer treatment, and probably given my personal cell phone number to way too many of them. I have become part of their lives. My wife, Kellee, puts up with countless phone calls and house calls all weekend long even when I am not on call. I am still on old school physician, always compelled to be a caregiver, 24/7. So, I decided to make my diagnosis public, the Sunday after my first infusion, with a social media post. The response was overwhelming! I received so many kind words and prayers of support and eventually made the decision to start this blog of my cancer journey.

A Patient Story:

I will leave you with this story of my relationship with one of my patients. It exemplifies my relationship with many of them. I have his permission to tell this story. When I went public with my diagnosis on social media, one response was from Andy Garrett, who said, “Doc, you saved my life in 2007 with skills that were God given. Prayers work and you are in mine.” Andy Garrett is a patient who turned into a close friend. Over his career in law enforcement, he worked his way all the way to the top, becoming the top ranked officer, Commander, of the large Metropolitan Nashville Davidson County Police Department Central Precinct and later becoming Chief of Police in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee. He is the kind of guy, like many law enforcement officers, who would take a bullet to save a complete stranger. One day back in 2007, I was seeing Andy for a separate problem, I think related to his ears. As I was leaving the exam room, kind of an aside, he stopped me and said he had a mild sensation of a lump in his throat on the right side. Other than that, he really had no other symptoms. Many of you who have read my earlier blog posts know that something in my head compelled me to take a biopsy of my own thumb to make the diagnosis of melanoma, which I felt was providential moment from God. In Andy’s case, there was a similar feeling, and again I feel it was a providential thought from God. Some call it the art of medicine, or a physician’s gestalt. But even though he was not very symptomatic, even though I had finished documenting his office encounter, and even though I was almost out of the room, my gut, or God, said to stop what I was doing, turn around and investigate further. I took a look at his throat with a head light, and it looked normal. Next, I told him to stay put, that we were going to investigate further. My nurse of many years, Lindsay, topically decongested his nose. I performed a procedure on him called flexible fiberoptic nasolaryngoscopy, in which a flexible scope is inserted into the nose, and then slowly navigated through the nasal passageways, behind the nose, past the soft palate, to the destinations of the tongue base, epiglottis, and the larynx (or voicebox). As I looked down his throat, I saw a subtle area of his right tongue base that did not look normal, which led to a tough conversation with this handsome, athletic appearing man, always dressed impeccably in uniform. I was concerned about throat cancer. After informed consent, I arranged to take a biopsy soon thereafter in the operating room, confirming the diagnosis, which we caught much earlier than most tongue base cancers. He underwent a tough treatment protocol, including both chemotherapy and radiation therapy, but remains cancer free to this day!

Not long after my good friend and patient Andy had been given a clean bill of health (after which I have seen him for years), something else happened in my office, something so powerful that I hope you keep reading. Our office had been a provider for a Medicaid plan that eventually went bankrupt and left many medical offices, including ours, unpaid for many services rendered ( I think almost $200,000 dollars for our practice). Eventually, years later, we had written the money off our books as a loss. I guess the insurance company was liquidated, and they tried to repay some of the debt. We got a check in the mail for about $2500 that was unexpected, and had nowhere to post the money, because the accounts had long been written off. I spoke to our Administrator and to Dr. Scott Fortune, my longstanding business partner, and we decided that our staff had really been working hard at the time and to simply give the money to them. We had about 25 employees at the time, and I personally walked around putting a note on each desk, thanking each of them, and giving them each an unexpected $100 to brighten their day. While I was walking around passing out those notes, Andy Garrett showed up at our front desk unannounced, and asked if he could slip something on my personal desk, which he did and then left. I never saw him that day, but after I passed all those $100 gifts to my employees, I walked right back to my office, where there laid an envelope labeled, “Dr. Bryant.”  I opened it, and inside Andy had written me a note that said, “Thanks Doc for saving my life…. I promise I will never waste another day!” I was moved to tears! And with the note was a restaurant gift card for guess how much…$100. Sometimes in life, you get what you give!

Thank you, God, for Andy, and for all my patients who have become part of my life over the years!

As I left off in the last blog, I described the day of my first IV infusion of Keytruda. After surgery for my right thumb malignant melanoma with sentinel node dissection, I would need a full year of these infusions to reduce the risk of recurrence. After the first infusion, I developed flu-like symptoms including fatigue, brain fog, muscle aches, and bone aches. My right arm continued to remain very tight and painful, and my thumb was continuing to heal. Over the next few weeks, I would have time to rest and to recover physically, emotionally, and spiritually. I would have time to reflect on my life prior to my diagnosis of cancer and to redirect my life with more balance. When I reflected on my life schedule prior to my diagnosis, it was absolutely mind boggling to me. I thought it was just a normal routine for a surgeon, but I was caught up in the busyness of life and neglecting my wellness.

Personal Life

Prior to the Covid pandemic, my days consisted of early to rise at 5 am for a workout, get dressed, eat breakfast, and out the door as early as 6:15 am when I had 7 am operating room starts. I typically would have a 45 minute – 1 hour commute home, and often would review imaging studies and finish notes in the evening. I was on call frequently on Monday nights and every few weekends, some busier than others. Wednesdays were always a long day in the operating room and then a rush across town to make supper at church around 5:30 – 5:45 pm followed by choir practice.

Other weeknights, Kellee and I often met at Nashville Predator hockey games, something we enjoyed together, but there were a lot of games, and it made for long clinic days the next day. We also attended every single Tennessee Titan home NFL game. After attending Brook Hollow Baptist Church, we would hustle down to Nissan Stadium on Titans home game days. On Sunday nights, Kels and I started hosting a young adult ministry in our homes, called “The Back Porch.”  We hosted these young adults for a fantastic meal, courtesy of Kels, and then we would worship together both in song and with a video series and discussion moderated by me. We remain very close to most of this group, many of whom have graduated from college, started families, and are doing great in their careers. In addition, I had a lot of hobbies (horseback riding, fishing, target shooting). I helped my Dad and Mom run a working farm, with several horses and lots of donkeys.  I spent most Friday afternoons working at the farm mucking stalls and grooming/caring for the horses. I have been riding horses for over 50 years, and it has always been a passion (so I have enclosed several farm pictures!) So, everyday life was crazy busy, not counting all the time Kels and I spent with our extended families on both sides. We both have big families and would gather frequently for birthdays and holidays. And that was just our personal life!

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Life as a Surgeon

Professionally, I had a passion for performing sinus surgery in the office, and over a 10-year period, along my practice partner and close friend of 33 years, Dr. Scott Fortune, helped to develop techniques and anesthesia protocols to allow us to perform many procedures in the office that would have typically been performed in the OR in the past. I began working with a company called Entellus, which was later bought out by Stryker. Our office became a designated Center for Excellence by Entellus and later by Stryker. Along with Dr. Fortune, I became a Physician Trainer for Entellus and later Stryker. We both began to lecture and teach all around the country. Both Dr. Fortune and I hosted physicians on Fridays to watch us operate in the office and learn our protocols. This grew into a situation that was at least 3 Fridays a month. Often, we would entertain the physicians and company representatives on Thursday nights before the cases on Friday, taking an evening away from spending time with Kellee. I was nominated to be on the election ballot to be on a Board of Director At Large for of the American Academy of Otolaryngology/Head and Neck Surgery. I gave several national presentations at the American Academy of Otolaryngology/Head and Neck Surgery. I had served as Chief of Surgery at Summit Medical Center for 5 years and was later asked to be on the Board of Trustees, where I served for 6 years, 3 of which were serving as Chairman. I also served as a Clinical Instructor for Trevecca Nazarene University PA program, hosting students for 6-week rotations with me. I continued to serve on the Deacons Committee at church, with 2 stints as Chairman (the last one being during the Covid pandemic). Finally, I served for over 2 decades as President of Allergy & ENT Associates of Middle Tennessee, our company that had 40-50 employees. I somehow found time to do consulting work, including peer review work and expert witness work for malpractice cases.

So, the busyness of life had slowly crept into my life, taking away sincere and daily lengthy meaningful time in prayer and in the Word. One would think that having multiple hand surgeries for trigger fingers in 5 years would alert me that I was going too hard and needed to slow down. But it took losing a part of my finger to slow me down! Brook Hollow Baptist Church Pastor Tom Gholson was preaching a series of sermons from James and read the following scripture. James 4:13-16 says, “Now listen, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.’ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes. Instead, you ought to say, ‘If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.’ “  

My medical diagnosis forced me to take a deep breath, slow down, listen for those providential moments I have described previously, and redirect how I spend my time. Life is just a mist! What are we doing? Are we focusing on heavenly things? Despite the medical treatment and the inability to work…I began to experience a lot of joy in my life…