Wade Hayes, 45, was born to be a country music star. Wade, son of professional country musician Don Hayes was inspired by his father to play the mandolin as well as the guitar. At age 11, he was signed to an independent record label and also played with his father’s band throughout high school.
The younger Hayes made headlines for songs centered on loneliness, heartache and despair. In 1994, his debut album soared to the top of the charts, earning him his first of two gold albums. He’s also had multiple singles top the Billboard charts, including his debut single “Old Enough to Know Better” reaching No. 1.
But Hayes had to start singing a different tune after a shocking diagnosis of colon cancer in 2011 at the age of 42.
“I thought colon cancer was something older people got,” he says. “I didn’t have a family history of the disease, so going from touring, writing songs and making records to being a cancer patient was a shock.”
Looking back, Hayes admits he shouldn’t have been surprised. For years he ignored colon cancer symptoms, such as lethargy and blood in his stools.
“My doctor told me I had cancer for years, probably [since] my 30s.” he says. “It wasn’t something that happened overnight.”
According to the Colon Cancer Alliance, colon cancer is the third most commonly diagnosed and second deadliest cancer in the United States, after lung cancer. . Its other symptoms include:
• A change in bowel habits, including diarrhea or constipation, or a change in stool consistency
• Rectal bleeding
• Persistent abdominal discomfort, such as cramps, gas or pain
• Feeling your bowel doesn’t empty completely
• Weakness or fatigue Unexplained weight loss
Many people don’t experience symptoms in the early stages of the disease, however. Only about 4 in 10 cases of colon cancer are caught in the disease’s early, and most treatable, stages, according to the American Cancer Society.
“Early diagnosis really is key,” Hayes says. “Anyone with family history or experiencing any symptoms, regardless of their age, should talk to their doctor and get checked out.”
Besides your genes, other risk factors include:
• Age: Most people diagnosed are older than 50.
• A history of chronic inflammatory disease of the colon such as Crohn’s or colitis
• A diet low in fiber and high in fat
• Race: African Americans have a greater risk
Read the whole informative article at the link below.
By Gina Roberts-Grey, Special to Lifescript
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Donate an instrument and Change a Child’s Life
The Instrument Drive is back! After a one year hiatus, the instrument drive, now produced by Bringing Music to Life, will be held in Denver and throughout Colorado March 16-28. Bringing Music to Life was founded and is directed by Steve Blatt, who established and ran the instrument drives at Colorado Public Radio.
“Over the course of four drives,” Blatt said, “we distributed nearly 2,000 orchestra and band instruments to more than 100 schools throughout Colorado. We’re looking forward to reaching even more children this year.”
If you have a gently-used band or orchestra instrument that is no longer being played, please bring it to one of the drop-off locations. It will be repaired and awarded to a deserving, underfunded music program, and you’ll be giving the gift of music to a child in Colorado.
“If you don’t have an instrument, you can still help by contributing to the repair fund,” Blatt explained. “Instrument repairs are the single greatest cost of the program, with the average repair costing nearly $100.”
There are 17 donation locations for the March drive, including 12 in the greater Denver area. Complete information is available at the website: http://www.bringmusic.org.
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Memorial for Nightclub Fire That Killed 100 May Open in 2016
WARWICK, R.I. (AP) – The group planning a memorial to 100 people killed in a 2003 nightclub fire has raised one-fourth of the money needed to build and maintain the project, and its leader said Sunday she expects it to open next year.
Gina Russo, a survivor of the fire and president of the Station Fire Memorial Foundation, spoke to survivors and victims’ family and friends at a memorial ceremony at Warwick City Hall.
“Twelve years of my life has been about this,” Russo said. She said she had expected after the fire that the entire process wouldn’t take more than two years.
Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo also attended the event, which had been postponed a month because of a snowstorm.
“This is going to be the year that this is going to happen,” Raimondo said. “The work and all the fundraising is going to culminate, and this memorial will become a reality.”
Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian, also the mayor then, said the night of the fire was a moment when communities around the region came together to help the victims, who included people from Connecticut and Massachusetts as well as Rhode Island.
“We want to make sure we harness that same energy again and move forward to make sure that site of tragedy becomes a site of solace, reflection and reconciliation,” he said.
Pyrotechnics for the band Great White set fire to flammable foam inside the Station nightclub on Feb. 20, 2003. Besides those killed, more than 200 were injured.
The memorial will be built where the nightclub stood. It will feature a gazebo, an archway reading “Station Fire Memorial Park,” and 12 circular shapes in the ground that Russo said will look like CDs, or vinyl records. In each circle, granite monuments in the shape of speaker boxes each will have a portrait etching of a fire victim’s face.
Russo said three-phase construction could begin this spring or early summer, and be completed as early as the spring of 2016. She said the foundation has raised $500,000 of the $2 million needed for the project.
By Ignacio LaGuarda