Darrell had been writing in a Note on his phone the story of his journey, his testimony. He never got the chance to share that publicly.
Introduction
How many remember the TV sitcom “Newhart” from the late 80s that had the 3 brothers
introduced as “Hi, I’m Larry. This is my brother Darryl, and this is my other brother Darryl?” Hi, I’m Darrell.
I am 56 years old, married to my awesome and beautiful wife Stephanie for 33 years. I have two sons, Tanner and his beautiful wife Haley and Brennan and his beautiful wife Kennedy and their adorable son Jennings who’s 9 months old. He happens to be our first grandchild.
I am a plumber at Bowers plumbing. Brennan, Stephanie, and I run the business and, Stephanie and I share the same office. I am not a speaker. This is not something that comes natural to me.
- Isaiah 55:10 – As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the Earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: it will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
Symptoms
My symptoms started early in 2024, representing as UTI symptoms. This affected dinner outings, trips, and just life in general. I went to the Urologist at the beginning of 2025. I had a CT scan in January of 2025 of my abdomen and pelvis area.
Every doctor has a portal now days. That can be good and bad. We found out about the cancer first on the portal. We didn’t talk to the Doctor until the next day. I had a surgical procedure the next day to remove all they could of the tumor and get a biopsy. They weren’t able to remove the entire tumor as it had penetrated into the muscle part of the bladder wall.
Diagnosis
I received a call early one morning, a few days later from the Urologist. His words were, “I’ve got bad news…you have a rare form of cancer in the bladder and it’s aggressive.” I was diagnosed with small cell neuro endocrine carcinoma. It is considered rare because less than 1% of this type of cancer is found in the bladder.
Initial Response
My initial response to the diagnosis was like being given a death sentence. I let myself feel that I would be dead in 6 months. That day, nearly my entire family came to the house, much like you would do after a funeral. I was in a very bad place mentally and I had so many thoughts going through my mind. I have a 1966 Chevrolet C10 pickup that I had purchased about a month before all of this. I would go out into my shop and tinker on it. It was therapy in a way, and I poured my heart out to God out there. I cried buckets of tears and almost any song on the radio would cause me to unravel. I literally begged God to let me stay here a little while longer and I felt pretty alone during those first few weeks. I’ve told my father-in-law, Jerry, this several times, but just his presence brought me a certain level of comfort. I let myself get into this place even before my follow-up with the Urologist or seeing my Oncologist.
As the days passed, Stephanie asked what was going through my mind, but I was unable to answer verbally. I would immediately fall apart even thinking about it. I was headed to play golf with Brennan and Tanner one day and decided to use the voice feature on my phone to put down my thoughts during that time. It took a while to get through that, but I finally got it. This is what I listed:
- Things are going through my mind since I found out I have cancer. I can’t talk to you about this because I would spend the whole time crying.
- Leaving you here alone and I’m not able to take care of you.
- Leaving the boys without a dad and not being able to take care of them if they needed me. How old are they? 26 & 28?
- You getting married again. I want you to be happy and I guess I’m being selfish, but the thought of it really bothers me.
- Missing our grandkids grow up and seeing our family grow.
- Me turning into a shell physically and mentally of myself as I get worse.
- The memory of me fading away from everyone around me now. -I’ve never been this scared in my life and I fall apart sometimes, usually when I’m by myself. These thoughts will creep into my mind at any time. You and the boys give me comfort though.
Prayer
My only recourse was to turn to Jesus through prayer. I’ve been a Christian since I was 13 years old but haven’t lived my life the way I should at times. At this particular stage of my life, I was basically on cruise control just living life day to day without much, if any, thought of God in my life. I didn’t attend church. My life at that particular time was going well. But
I’d been complacent, unreliable, and had not been thankful for the good life I’d been blessed with.
Recap of 2 Kings 20-21: Often our prayers are pleas to avoid pain, but the irony is that pain is often where we draw near to God. When life is good and easy and we aren’t desperately seeking God anymore, we begin to feel a sense of distance. We begin to grow complacent. And before we know it, we remember what intimacy with God is like, but we can’t quite access it. So, we start to do our own thing, we stop listening. That’s what Hezekiah did when he had all kinds of treasures and blessings and suddenly felt like he didn’t’ need to listen to God or his prophet anymore. The very God and prophet who told him “Yes” in response to his prayer not to die. God granted him 15 more years of life.
I struggled with this because now I’m faced with possibly dying from cancer and I’m now turning to God to ask for help. Like a wayward son, I felt ashamed, but I knew I needed my father. I saw a quote from Corrie ten Boom that said, “Is prayer your steering wheel or your spare tire?” At that point in my life, I was looking for the spare tire.
As word spread about the cancer diagnosis, folks began to reach out and let me know they were praying for me. That was very comforting. One day, my family doctor, Scott Royster, texted Stephanie and asked if we would come to their office after closing time so that he and his staff could pray over us, and we graciously accepted. I could not tell you what was said during the different prayers, but I did have what I would consider a vision for lack of a better term. I was in a room with a door on the opposite side of the room. This door opens and there is a bright light on the other side. So bright that I cannot see with my eyes what’s on the other side. Yet, I knew that Jesus was on the other side. No words were spoken, only His smile. He let me know without words that he wasn’t concerned with what I had or hadn’t done in the past, it didn’t matter to Him. What mattered was that I was there now and He was ready to walk with me through this storm.
- Luke 15:20-24 says – So he got up and went to his father. But while he was still a long way off, his father saw him and was filled with compassion for him; he ran to his son, threw his arms around him and kissed him. The son said to him, “Father, I have sinned against heaven and against you. I am no longer worthy to be called your son.” But the father said to his servants, “Quick! Bring the best robe and put it on him. Put a ring on his finger and sandals on his feet. Bring the fatted calf and kill it. Let’s have a feast and celebrate. For this son of mine was dead and is alive again; he was lost and is found.” So, they began to celebrate.
This assured me that turning to Him right now was exactly what I should have done. It was an awesome reminder that God’s love is bigger than whatever our situation is and that he was gladly ready to help me in my time of need with open arms.
Treatment
I was referred to Dr. Chang, a urologist at Vanderbilt and he worked with my oncologist here in Huntsville. I started my first round of chemo on February 19, 2025, which consisted of a total of 4 rounds over a 12-week span. I had some nauseousness, lost my hair about midway through, and actually gained weight. I was 211 when I started and hit 250 at some point.
After finishing up with chemo, we went to Vanderbilt for scans and they found what appeared to be active cancer still at the original tumor site. Dr. Chang basically gave me two options: remove my bladder and place an ostomy bag on my side or leave my bladder and have radiation and chemo. As I said earlier, this cancer is rare in the bladder, so there is not a lot of data or statistics for them to go off as far as treatment.
I asked my urologist and radiation oncologist what my chances were with each option and basically was told it was about 50-50 either way. After praying, discussing it with Stephanie, and using the limited information I was given, I chose to keep by bladder and do radiation.
Stephanie and I drove from Huntsville to Nashville 5 days a week for 7 weeks. It was a grind, but not as bad as we thought it was going to be. The Lord was good.
The radiation itself was not bad during the 7 weeks, but after the conclusion of the treatments, I had severe bladder spasms for several weeks and was unable to work or do much of anything. I returned to Vanderbilt for another set of scans and a scope of the tumor in the bladder. I was very anxious, because I knew that if I still had the cancer, my prognosis statistically was not good.
My Response
Just before those scans I read Judges 6:23. Gideon was afraid he was going to die because he knew he was in the presence of God. That verse says, “But the Lords said to him, ‘Peace! Do not be afraid. You are not going to die.’” This verse jumped out at me as if in bold print and provided me with much comfort at that time. The verse wasn’t telling Gideon he was going to live forever but he was good right then and that’s the way I understood it for me. I felt as if God was telling me it was going to be okay right now.
You’re good for now.
Praise be to God! All the scans came back with no evidence of disease. So, at that point, I was cancer free and I gave all credit to God for that. That was early November 2025.
So, I had a wonderful Thanksgiving and Christmas last year.
Second Round
About 2 weeks after I had been given the all clear, I noticed I was having pain in my sternum and rib areas. It got increasingly worse to the point where if I coughed, sneezed or laughed, I felt like somebody was stabbing me with a knife. I remember jokingly asking Stephanie if they possibly dropped me during one of those procedures. I let that go on for about two months thinking that maybe I had just strained something.
Early Sunday morning on January 11th, I woke Stephanie to take me to the emergency room for severe pain in my abdomen. I stayed in the hospital for 3 days while they ran all kinds of tests and scans. They discovered that the cancer had metastasized into my liver and in my sternum and rib cage area and that was what had been causing my pain the entire time. Apparently, the cancer returned a couple weeks after I had been given the all clear. We immediately met with my oncologist here in Huntsville and the following week started another regimen of chemo, along with immunotherapy. This regimen, like the very first, consisted of 4 rounds over a 12-week span. I am currently in the middle of this treatment.
Where am I now?
I can’t say for sure that God allowed this cancer into my body in order for me to wake up and turn my Christian life around. What I do know beyond a shadow of doubt is that my Christian walk has done a 180-degree turn around. I was given a book by Benny Tate called Defy the Odds. I do NOT like to read and never have really. But something moved me to read this book. I won’t go into details, but it was about healing, overcoming and trusting God among other things. One thing that stood out to me was a story that Mr. Tate heard someone tell about a guy who got to heaven and saw thousands of beautifully wrapped boxes stacked high in all directions. He asked Saint Peter, “what are all these beautifully wrapped boxes.” Peter explained, “these are all of the things God wanted to give people, but they never asked for them.” This really resonated with me because we shouldn’t be afraid to ask for the big things. So, I asked for the big miracle because I don’t want to see any gift-wrapped packages with my name on it up there.
I also started reading my Bible daily using a book called the Bible Recap. Like I said earlier, I became a Christian at 13 and have never read the Bible all the way through. That’s a little embarrassing to admit at 56 years old. I truly was only getting baby food but now feel like I’m getting actual meat and potatoes. I’m experiencing God on an entirely
different level, and this has provided me so much comfort. God speaks to me in ways that I did not know was possible and that has been life changing.
I have no doubt that God can heal me and I’ll continue to ask. And I believe he will in 1 of 3 ways:
- I’ll be healed by God himself through His gift of healing.
- I’ll be healed by God using man-made medicine.
- Or I’ll be healed in heaven.
Conclusion
I am so thankful that it was me that got cancer and not my wife or kids. I’m thankful that my outlook on life has changed and I see life through a different lens. But even with all the positives of this, and knowing God is working through this for good, I have to be honest and say I wish this wasn’t happening to me. I wish there had been another way for me to wake up and make the same changes. But that is not how God planned it.
I thank God each morning when I wake up that he has given me another day. I’m going to continue to put one foot in front of the other and take this life one day at a time. I ask for the Holy Spirit to fill me each day so I can be the best Christian I can be for Him.
This is a terrible disease, but I pray that I can help someone with their walk-through cancer or help someone deal with all the emotions that come with a diagnosis like this, or help someone with their Christian walk, or help someone to receive Christ.
I pray that through my story you might consider a few things that I face daily:
- Life is short and the time limit of it is unknown.
- I have a glimpse, but God ultimately is the only one who knows.
- We are not guaranteed another day, week or year.
I have been a volunteer firefighter for over 20 years. I responded to fatalities where those folks were simply going about their day and never made it back home. Make the most of each day and treat it as a gift. Psalm 118:24 says, “This is the day the Lord has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” I’m thankful for every day that I have and every minute that I get to spend with my wife, kids, and family. I don’t take that for granted any longer because I know how precious that time is.
In closing, maybe your Christian walk is not where it should be. Or maybe you’ve never trusted Jesus as your Lord and Savior. I’d just ask that you’d give both of those situations some serious thought today. You can have the peace of knowing whatever happens here on this earth, you have the assurance of being in a better place when you leave here.
- Proverbs 3:5-6 – Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.