Heroes: Shawna Oleson

“Medford Teen Is Just Doing What Needs To Be Done”

The Star News, Medford WI
January 19, 2006

Shawna Oleson loves her kittens. The kittens were found in her garage this fall abandoned by their mother, a neighborhood stray. Shawna helped to feed them with an eyedropper every four hours, burp them, bathe them and otherwise care for them until they were weaned from the bottle. Shawna loves animals and has a dog, Copper, who share her love for the kittens and a cat, Sadie, who doesn’t want anything to do with them.

This past Christmas, Shawna and her mother Deb Brahmer sold Christmas tree ornaments that hung on a tree at Bogey’s Bar in downtown Medford and in the process raised $300 for Gentle Hearts Animal Shelter. It was a way to give back to the community.

Shawna’s eyes glitter with a mischievous twinkle as she jokes with her mother. Like any teenager she agrees with her parent some of the time and rolls her eyes when she doesn’t.

Shawna is a typical 17-year-old girl who loves playing video games and who doesn’t like being in the spotlight. She likes to spend time with her friends and wishes her class schedule at Medford Area Senior High School where she is a junior allowed her to be in more classes with them.

Now that she has a cell phone, Shawna is looking forward to taking walks with her dog. The cell phone is important because Shawna has brain cancer and is subject to mini-seizures about once a week, which can leave her numb and make it difficult to walk. “They never happen at school,” Shawna complains, instead they seem only to interrupt her life when she is doing something she enjoys. She noted that afterward she can’t even play her video games because her coordination is off.

(Shawna is pictured here with Dean Brown, a member of Tim McGraw's band, the Dancehall Doctors. He and three of his bandmates ran in the 2005 St. Patrick's Day 5K in Milwaukee, Wisconsin to raise funds and awareness for the Tug McGraw Foundation, and Shawna met them there to cheer them on.)

Shawna wants her mother to help her shave the remaining hair off her head noting that she would rather have her head shaved than deal with the hair
thinned by months on chemotherapy and radiation. “At least it isn’t falling out like it used to,” she said tugging on a brown strand of hair.
Shawna is a bright, spirited girl who accepts her cancer as something that she needs to deal with and move on. Cancer is nothing new for Shawna. She is facing and fighting it for the second time around in her young life.

In 1999, Shawna was diagnosed with brain cancer and underwent surgery to try and remove the tumor. The doctors got as much as they could and chemotherapy treatments forced the cancer into remission.

“With the kind of cancer she has, the goal is to try and stop it from spreading,” Brahmer said. Shawna’s cancer is diagnosed as a GBM grade IV.

In 2004, Brahmer noticed that her daughter’s seizures were happening more often and that she was having other problems. A routine MRI confirmed that the cancer was again growing and on October 6, 2004, Oleson underwent another surgery followed up by 33 radiation treatments that lasted until December 2004 and chemotherapy. Originally, the plan was to keep her on chemotherapy for a year, but her doctor hopes to keep her on the Temodar for as long as her body can take the chemicals and so far it has been 16 months. Shawna takes seven pills a day for five straight days that keeps her cancer in check. Shawna has an MRI done every three months to track the cancer and to make sure it has not spread.

“She is doing great. Her next MRI is scheduled for next month. Instead of having MRIs every two months, she will be getting them every three,” Brahmer said. As a parent, Brahmer says the entire ordeal has been a scary one. She explained that the first time around was more scary because they did not know what to expect. At that time, the surgery was done on a Tuesday and by Friday she was home and back at school within
weeks.

Unlike the fast recovery of the first surgery, the 2004 surgery had more complications including Shawna’s right side being numb. Therapy at the hospital and physical therapy at home increased her use of her right side. However, even today her right foot is still numb. “If she stepped on her cat’s tail with that foot she wouldn’t know it unless the cat made noise,” Brahmer said.

Brahmer’s pride in her daughter is evident through the website notes that she writes at a site maintained to keep people updated on Shawna’s progress. Brahmer has also become involved and is a supporter of the Tug McGraw Foundation, which raises money to help find a cure for brain cancer. Shawna was featured on the foundation’s web site last February. “She is the strongest person I know. She’s been there, done that twice!! She gives us strength. She is a fighter and will fight to win this battle!” wrote Brahmer on the web site.

Shawna makes light of the cancer that forces her to only have half-days of schools and the recurring seizures that make getting a driver’s license impossibility. “You do what you have to do to get rid of it,” Shawna says of the cancer.

Meanwhile, Shawna has her kittens.

(Story written by News Editor Brian Wilson)