“Golf provides healing for cancer sufferer
Local businessman qualifies for city tournament, but real battle is yet to come”</p>
<p>Its cloudy on Friday, but in the locker room, Steve Caswell liberally applies sunscreen 70 SPF, as strong as he can find before playing in Spring Valley Country Clubs weekly dogfight.</p>
<p>Its a half-hour process, he said, reaching for a wide-brimmed hat to complete his golf ensemble.</p>
<p>But when youre eight months into a life-and-death battle with Stage 4 lung cancer and youre determined not to miss any golfing opportunities then you do what you have to do.</p>
<p>(Golf) is one thing thats kept me going, Caswell said, his face ruddy from a rash caused by medication. Golf is part of the recovery.</p>
<p>In fact, golf along with his family and religious faith have been Caswells pillars since November, when radiologist Paul Aitchison, a golfing buddy, discovered a baseball-sized tumor in his right lung.</p>
<p>Bothered by lower-back pain, Caswell had gone in for an MRI. Paul said, Lets do a CT scan of your chest; its probably a muscle strain. Instead, the exam showed a mass in his lung, plus a tumor in his tailbone that was causing the back pain.</p>
<p>When I told Steve, I think I was white as a sheet, said Aitchison, who three weeks earlier had learned his young daughter, Morgan, has leukemia. It was a rough day.</p>
<p>An unfair day, too; Caswell is a lifetime nonsmoker and fitness buff. He and his wife, Melanie, were devastated.</p>
<p>It was like the world stopped spinning for a while, she said. But we knew God was in control; he gives us the grace to go on.</p>
<p>And so they have. Now, his friends and family believe there is not much Caswell cant handle.</p>
<p>It was no surprise, they say, when the one-time single-digit handicap player, whose game suffered during his illness, decided to attempt to qualify for this weeks Fairway Outreach City Tournament and then shot even-par 71 to tie for low score.</p>
<p>It did not stun them when the 46-year-old businessman beat J.B. Murphy, who is headed to Furman on a golf scholarship, in a playoff for medalist honors.</p>
<p>Caswell will not play at The Windermere Club this week. He, Melanie and their five daughters (Garner Leigh, 17; Davis Brooke, 15; Jamie Keith, 14; Abbey Hill, 11; and Claxton Grace, 6) are enjoying a previously scheduled family vacation in Litchfield Beach. The trip is being presided over by her father, former USC football coach Jim Carlen.</p>
<p>If he were playing, though, his friends might give him a shot to knock off nine-time champion Steve Liebler. After all, Caswell has already beaten a far tougher foe.</p>
<p>Lung cancer as advanced as his is not typically curable; maybe one to two percent (recover), Aitchison said. Soon after the diagnosis, Caswell was flown to Houstons M.D. Anderson cancer-treatment center. Carlen had called on friends from his coaching days at Texas Tech to expedite the admission.</p>
<p>Otherwise, all I can do is pray for him, Carlen said.</p>
<p>Four days earlier, Caswell shot 75 at Spring Valley, but in Houston he needed a wheelchair to get off the airplane and morphine for the back pain. When he returned to Columbia, radiation oncologist Raleigh Boulware (father of NFL stars Peter and Michael) treated the tailbone tumor; 15 days later, Caswell was walking.</p>
<p>Next came three months of chemotherapy, during which his weight dropped from 217 to 183. In April, he began taking the oral drug Tarceva.</p>
<p>(Doctors said) chemo is like the defensive line, holding (cancer) at bay, Caswell said. Tarceva is like the linebackers.</p>
<p>There was golf, too. The first time Caswell played again, Steve played the whole round like he might break in half, Aitchison said. But as his strength came back, so did Caswells game, and his joy of playing.</p>
<p>Golf has been therapy, Melanie said. The camaraderie, being with your people.</p>
<p>His people marvel at Caswells golfing recovery.</p>
<p>He hits it further than ever, buddy Matthew Fleming said, laughing. And if he goes in the trees, he gets what we call Caswell bounces.</p>
<p>Recent chest scans are promising. Paul said if there were (originally) 100 pieces of cancer, now there are three to four, Caswell said. The medicine has worked; the cancer is almost gone.</p>
<p>Aitchison agrees, to a point.</p>
<p>Right now, hes on a better pace than anything Ive seen. If hes still in check in five years …</p>
<p>Caswell understands I may be chasing cancer the rest of my life, he said.</p>
<p>And so he lives with renewed purpose. In May, Caswell, Aitchison, Fleming and others staged a golf tournament at Spring Valley, raising $25,000 for cancer charity Childrens Chance.</p>
<p>Hes a take-charge guy, Carlen said of his son-in-law, adding with a laugh, His personality is like mine.</p>
<p>Caswell has his family, friends and his faith. And he has golf, which has played its role.</p>
<p>His next scan is scheduled in about two months. Until then, youre likely to find Caswell on the golf course sunscreen and all.
The heart has its own reasons.</p>