sean marsee`s smokeless death-article - WW

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READER'S DIGEST
It
If
Searl'
Marsees' T
"Smokeless.
Death
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By JACK
SPOT wid'; its
.
. hard white cb're was the size '
. '
of a half-doll,ar. It belonged,
thought Dr. Carl Hook, in the
mouth 9f a 75-year,..:0Id who had
been dipping snuff s;nce thc~e of
three, not on the tongue 6'f'; the
high-school boy who sat across
from him. ''I'm sorry, Sean," said
.~ : the Ada, Okla" throat specialist.
' ~:' ,
doesn't look good. We']] have
:"t·t~." to do a biopsy."
".'
M aCSec ~~·s
. S<;~..:".>
stunned. + ,Ie;:::didn 't '
smoke or drink.
You couldn't and
wIn 2B' medals
HE ANCRYRED
:It
FINCHER
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,,The young athlete
, in perfect physical
shape-so what
could there be
dipping'snuff?
didn't realize.,­
'":IS too la te­
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running anchor leg on the 'loo-meter
rclay. A taperC<,d five-fool-five, 130
. pounds, Sean had always taken
, ex cellent care of his body: watch­
ing his diet, lifting weights, running five miles a day six mOllths
of the year.
Now Ihis . I·low co uld it be?
True, he was never withuut a dip.
He used up a can of snuff, a type of
smokdess (obacco, every day and a
half, holding it in his mouth to get
a/nicotine jolt without smoking. It
'was popular among high-school ath ­
letes who didn't want to break train­
ing. "But ('didn't know snuff could
be that bad for you," Sean said.
"No warning label or anything.
And all those ads on TV. . . ."
A Milld of His Own. Eighteen­
year-old Sean had been secretly us­
ing "srnokdess"-chewingtobacco
briefly, then snuff-since he was 12.
His mother, 'Belly, a registered
nurse, had hit the roof when she
found ou~. Didn't he kn~w tobacc,o
was hazardous, smoke. or no
smoke?
Sean rcJU5ed to believe her.
Would sports stars sell snuff o n TV
ifit hurt you? Why, even his coach,
Jim Brigance, a bear for condition­
ing, knew boys on his team dipped
and didn't make a big thing of it.
Finally, BellY dropped the sub ­
ject. It had been Sean who pulkd
his sister M a rian Ollt of the lake
when shc fcllthrough (hc ice; Sca n
who was his ~istcr Melis sa 's model
for all ideal llllsballd; Seal] who
taught his younger brolhers ShJn­
non and Jasoll (0 hUIII, fish Jlld
108
tr a p; Scan who planned (0 join tI' t:
Arrlly Airborne,' as a career and 1(;
get his college ed uca tion paiJ fe' f.
The oldest of her fi ve childrell had
a mind o f his own .
l:lesides, B<.:Hy, a single par tllt ­
working the ho sp i! a l night shifl i ll
Ada, had enou gh to think abulil
just rai sing the child,elL Th en SOil
had come 10 her with his ugly SOle,
BellY lOok OIl<': look; her llearl sa lli; ,
AnJ now Dr. H oo k was SJyillg ,
''I'm afraid wc'lI ha ve to rtlll ()\'t:
that part of your tongue, Scan."
The high-sch,ool seni'or WJs.2i:
Ic:nt. "Can I still run in the slate
·-- tra ck meet this weekend?" he final ..
ly asked. "And graduate: next
mOllth?" Dr. Hook noJJed .
A Necessary Mutilation. On
May 16" . 1983, (he oper ation was
performed at the Valley View 1·105­
pita! in Ada. More
Scan's ton g uc
hadtq be rem ov ed thall Dr. I-look
had anticipated. Worse, the tu';ll o r
biopsy was p<JS iti ve. Oncc the sWyll­
ing in his mouth went down , Sean
:igreed to sec a radia[ion therJpist.
Before therapy could begin,
howe ve r, a ncwly ,swo llen IYlnph
node was found in Scan's neck. :lIi
oYni nous sign that th!= , cancc:f had ..
-~p'read. Radi ca l neck surgery would
nolY' be Ileeded. Ge ntl y Or. H()Ok
recommended (he severest oplion:
removi ng Ihe lower jaw Of! ,he:
right siJe as well as all lym ph
nodes, lIlt1scl<.:s a no blood ves sels
eX}C!Jt the life -s ll sld inin g c~r o ( ill
art'ciy. There mi g ht be some: sink ­
ing, but the chin wou ld SllPPOf( Ihe
general planes of the face.
or
RLWER'S DIGEST
19 8 5
JoiN MARSEE'S SMOKELESS DEATH.
Betty Marsee began to cry. Scan
was being asked to a!)!-lrove his own .
m'tltilation-Sean whQ was 50 fas- .
tidious about his appearance that ·
he'd even swallow his Jip rather'·
Ithan be caught spining tohacco .
juice. They sat in silence for ten
. minutes. Then, dimly, she hearJ
him say, "Not the jawbone. Don't
take the jawbone."
"Okay, Scan," Dr. I-look said
softly. "But the ' rest; that's the least
We should do."
On June 20 Scan underwent a
second operation, which lasted
eight hours. That same month 150
students and teachers at Talihina
High assembled to honor their
most outstanding athlete. Scan
could not be there to receive !tis
award.
Coach Brigance and his assistant
came to the Marsee trailer home to
present him with the walnut
plague. T h ey tried not to stare- at
the huge scar that ran like a railroad
track from their star performer's
earlobe to his breastbone. Smiling
crookedly out of the other side of
his mouth, Sean thanked them.
Las t Lap. Miraculous ly , Sean
snapped back. Whe n D r. Hook saw
him that August, he showed no
trace of his ordeal except the white
incision scar. Five weeks of radiation therapy were behind him . Scan
greeted his doctor with enthusiasm,
plainly happy to be alive .
11e really bclir:vCJ his JIlPr:rh phyJical condition is going 10 lick it, Carl
I' look thought, driving home. ut's
hope hc's going to wiT! this racc too.
llutin October Scan started 113..v­
ing he~(hches. A CAT sqn S}lOW(!J twin tc~(';iCles of fresh m'jllgn~;i(y, on~ snaking down his back, the
other .c,urling unJer the base of his brain. . Scan had his third operation in November 1983.ltwas the jaw­
bone operation he'.had feared-and more. After ten hours on the oper­ ating tabl~, he had four huge drains coming ' from a foot-long c'r escent woU:nd; a 'breathing tube sticking out of a hole in his throat, a feeding tube through his nose, and two tubes in hisarm veins. Scan looked at Betty as if to say, My God, Mom, I didn't know it was going to hurt likr: this. The Ma rsees brought Scan home for Christmas. Even then, he re-
mained optimistic, untilth.c day in January when he found lumps in the left side of his neck . Later, Betty answered when the hospital phoned the results of another oiop­ sy. Scan knew the news was bad by her silent tears as she listened. When she hung up, he was in her arms, and for the first time since the awful nightmare started, grit­ tough Sean Marsee began to sob. After several minutes, he straightened and said, "Don't wor­ ry. I'm going to be fine." Like the winning rHnner he was, he still had faith in his finishing kick. For thC', last two weeks of Scan's
life, his adjustable hospital bed dOllli­
lIated the trailer's li~ing room. Coach Brigance visited often, sometillles with a check from Talihina·area (09
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Od ore:
thing to skHe with young alhln , ..
"later ." Sean wrote two i)fief Ill c)'
sages, One was a sirnple declaraliull
of Christian faith . The other W;1 S ;\
plea: DOTl'[ dip snllff
Early on Pcbruar y 25, 19 84, S <:;1 11
smileJ a tired smile at his si s(tr
Marian and f1'~sheJ an index finger
skyw;Jrd. All hour bter he died .
Ti III C 13 0 III U in
the Mouth. La st
February, Betty
Mar see was a ITlOIl l:
5'\ witnesses wLo
testified at a M;JS ­
sachllsetls Public
Health Departmen t
hearing on whether
tp lalxl snuff a haz ­
ardous subslance .
.
The Marsces had
determineJ to tell
Scan's story: "If we
';'J'...{.. ,.;...i-.....,
didn't sp,eak o ut,
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nothing .';;";JS going
,; .. ~, '. id '<: {"
Photos tell Stan's tragic slory
to get bettcr."
Scientists testified 'that the CO \1­
that he still craved snuff. "I catch
nection
between snu(f and oral canmyself thinking," he said, ''I'll jllS!
cer, the nation's se:vcnth leading '
r~ach ova arid hav~ a dip." Then he
added thal he wished he could visit cause of cancer dcath, cannot be
the high-school locker room to questioned. The cul~rit: highly po­
show the athletes "what y.ou look tent callcer-causin'g cornr o unds
called nitrosamines, one 0 'vIIbich
tike when YOli usc it." His appear­
forms ill the mouth through the
ance, he knew, would be persua­
sive. A classmate who had come to chemical interaction of saliva and
tobacco. According . to Stephen
sec him fainted dead away.
Hecht, an organic chemist with lhe
One friend who diJn'l f1inch
American Health Foundation, a
was John O'Dell, then 29, a former
dip of snuff deli vers rou gb ly the
football player from the local fel­
lowship of Christian Athletes. John same amourlC of ni cotillc a ~ a ciga ­
rettc and ten timn thc nilr osarnines.
asked Sean, when he became unable
There arc nOW 6 mill ion [Q 10 Inil ­
to speak, if he'd like to pcncil sorne-
residents, teachers and classmates
who knew how harJ-!-lresscd tbe
Marsees must he .
Almost to the end Sea n insisted
on caring for himself, p;]cking his
wound and cleaning and reinsert­
ing his breathing tube several
times a day.
.
One day Sean confessed to Betty
­
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"':IT .· ·K,:I·~;~J
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, ' 19 85
SEAN MARSEE'S SMOKELESS DEATH
lion consumers o f '
R O GER Mc DOWELL, the fireb :dling, righthandeJ m " in ­
sn u ff, and sales arc
my of the New York Mets' bullpen , stanc,9 2,J f?(PJ llg
r.j~ ~n.g 8 percent
snuff five years ~ g o when he was a so pf.f6m6 rt at
a nnuall y, " The
Dowling Green Sta te Uni versity in Ohio. "A lot of the
more I dipped, the
older player~ on the baseball team were usille it," he
more I li k ed it,"
remembers, "so I did 100 . " By the time he signed 10 play
with the Mets' f;/orm club in Jackson, Miss., he was up 10
said Paul Hughes,
a (an every two days. Then he mel his fU.lure wife,
18, a six-four foot­
Karen, who recalis, "Roger wouldn't dip around me. I
ball
co-optain
iuS!
said to him when I saw him do it alICe, ' Ugh, how
f rom Nort h E aston,
(;/on you do that~'"
M ass. " M a kes you
Slill, it wasn 't unlil "fler their marriage that Roger
feel-you k n ow,
g';lve up dipping "Itogether. That was the night they
calms you d own .
learned of Se:on Marsce 's tragic fate on '''SixlY Minutes ."
When I tried to
Karen turned to Roger and said, "Promise me you're
stop, I couldn't."
going to quit." He p(Qmised . And quit he did. Today
Alan Lawrence, his
the only dipping done in the McDowell family is by his
blning fast b:llL Sums up Roger: "Taking snuff is an
co-captain of the
unhealthy h;;lbit, and :wy young athlete who values his
football team in
physical condition should stay away from it."
Tauntoll, Mass.,
said, "In our school,
about three-quarten of the: kids setu Department of Public Health,
who play sports do it. As ;;In every­ concedes that "we: don't know how
d;;lY ~hing . " Added Andover dental much oral cancer is caused by snuff.
hygienist Joan Walsh, "Many But we do know that each year we
have about 29,000 new cases of oral
equate it with gum chewing."
Scientific witnesses for the cancer and 9000 deaths in this
Smokeless Tobacco Council ar­ country. Toba cco of on5c,kil~d or
gued that no undisputed scientific another is believed to account for
evidence exists proving its product about 70 percent of it. According to
'causes any human disease or is the National Cancer Institute, if
clinically addictive. Nitrosamines you use snuff regularly you increase
have p (oduced can'cer in some lah­ your risk fourfold."
Sho r tly before his death, Sca n
orator), animals, but have not been
~hown to ~use cancer in any hu­ Marsee told his mother that thefC
must be a reason G od decided not
m a n being, they pointe~ ,o ut.
to S:lve him. "I think the reason is
Dr. Gregory Connolly, director
what we're doing right now," says
of dent;)1 health for the MJs5achu­
Betty Marsee . "Keeping other kids
frorrl dying-that's Scan's legacy."
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fO{ informati on on reprints
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this article. see page 247
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