Hope in the face of tragedy

Kyle Charvat unhooked the IV from his chest, stowing it back into a hiking backpack containing an FDA-approved, phase-two, cancer-fighting treatment.

"And that is how it's done," he said with a grin on his face.

He proceeded to talk about a 15-year-old cancer patient he met while receiving treatment who informed him about the more aesthetic hiking pack to tote his treatment in, instead of the "man purse" he initially owned.

Unlike the way many people would react to the idea of cancer, Kyle possesses a unique positivism that many would find unfathomable.

"After all Kyle has been through, he has managed to maintain an unwavering optimism that if you believe you're going to live, you will," said his mom, Sheryl Charvat.

During his freshman year of college, which for most students is an exciting time of freedom, anonymity and an avenue to start fresh, Kyle was forced to endure a series of hardships most people could never imagine going through.

While at a baseball tournament in Oklahoma during fall quarter 2002, Kyle received an urgent phone call that his father, Glenn, had experienced a heart attack. After enduring 24 hours of layovers and several flights, he made it back to Seattle to find his father in critical condition.

Balancing a full class schedule and pledging Theta Chi fraternity, Kyle took over the family golf green business while his father recovered. After a short time, Kyle began to get incessant headaches and double vision.

"At first we figured it was just a sinus infection and even visited the doctor twice, who concluded that I was OK. But after having to take finals with one hand over my eye ... I knew something was wrong," he said.

Something definitely was wrong. On Dec. 22, 2002, a CT scan revealed a large tumor in his thalamus, the part of the brain that controls motor functions and receives auditory and visual sensory signals. The doctors told him he had three weeks to three months to live.

"I was in complete shock," said Kyle, "My mom had to leave the room. It was just devastating news."

The Charvat family, with a history of enduring difficult times, refused to give up. Immediately after the news, Kyle checked into Overlake Hospital for shunt surgery, a procedure that diverts fluid from the brain and is safely absorbed into the bloodstream. When he woke up the next day he felt completely fine.

"The entire time he was joking, saying things like, 'Maybe I can blow the tumor out of my nose,'" remembered Sheryl.

Aaron Kahler, one of Kyle's fraternity brothers and a best friend from high school, recalled how Kyle refused to have a negative attitude, especially around his pledge class.

"It was a big shock around the fraternity at first, but Kyle's good humor and confidence made it better for everyone around him. One night [our pledge class] went over to his house and hung out, and it really brought up his spirits and strengthened our class bond," Kahler said.

Kyle then moved to the UW Medical Center to undergo a biopsy, a procedure where he had a three in 100 chance of hemorrhage. This seemingly minute possibility occurred, and Kyle literally stood on the verge of death. What some may be described as a miracle occurred for the Charvat family that day, and Kyle made it through the night.

Taking no chances from that point forward, his doctors decided to treat the tumor as a worst-case scenario. While Kyle recovered in intensive care, his father experienced heart failure and was brought to the UWMC, his mother tirelessly running back and forth between her husband's and son's rooms.

Radiation was the next step for Kyle, which he recalls as "a horrible pain, worse than chemotherapy, which most people don't realize."

He got through the entire six weeks of treatments and even forced himself to keep up a fitness routine.

"I managed to workout all during the radiation, and eventually got to the point where I was going up and down the stairs, getting up, walking around the table ... I did some aerobics, but not in the spandex and towel, of course," he said.

Kyle went into a chemotherapy treatment that came in capsule form, so he could go home and continue with school.

During this time, Kyle was able to continue making the dean's list every quarter. He has 3.73 cumulative GPA, he said. Ana Larson, UW astronomy professor, remembered Kyle as never asking for any special treatment or extra help.

"Kyle was very weak during this time because he was undergoing chemo, but he still made an incredible effort. When he was in class, he always participated and was very attentive, managing to receive a 4.0 at the end. Sometimes he would joke about being in love with our TA; he had such a great sense of humor," said Larson.

In October 2003, the Charvat family finally received the news they had waited incessantly for: the tumor was shrinking. Up until this point, Kyle vowed not to become involved in a relationship because the possibility of him surviving the cancer was not very high.

"I didn't want to drag anyone else into my situation because it wouldn't be fair to anyone. But I thought it was over and that's when I decided to date Megan (Oldfield, a member of the Delta Zeta sorority)," Kyle said.

Everything seemed to pick up in Kyle's life. He was doing well in school, involved in a serious relationship, staying active in his fraternity and volunteering as a FIG leader and his father returned to good health after a successful open-heart surgery.

Then in July 2004, Kyle's mother had what she described as a premonition that the cancer would return. She was right.

The Charvat family discovered in October 2004 that the tumor had begun to grow again, and this time, conventional medicine could not help.

They needed to find an alternative, and they needed one quickly. Besides the pain of having to endure the news himself, Kyle found it even more difficult to tell his girlfriend.

"When we found out about his tumor growing again, it was devastating, of course," remembered Megan. "Kyle sincerely offered to break up to spare me any further pain but the thought didn't even enter my mind. I love him completely and fully, for better or worse already."

That October, Kyle underwent Gamma Knife Surgery, a procedure that pinpoints problem areas in the brain and destroys them with multiple beams of Gamma radiation.

After extensive research, his mother found a clinic in Houston that might be the glimmer of hope in their dim situation.

The highly specialized clinical trial at the Burzynski Clinic where more than 200 people have had fatal brain tumors reversed was denied any support from the Charvat's insurance company, Molina Insurance. The family had to pay out of their own pockets, along with help from friends and family.

"It's amazing the fact that Kyle has this wonderful support system from the students, the faculty and the doctors of the UWMC; all of that combined is making it easier for us as a family," said Glenn.

Members of Theta Chi have come together to make red wristbands similar to the LiveSTRONG Lance Armstrong bracelets for the Kyle Charvat Fund, which will read "KC '05" along the bottom and "A Helping Hand" across the top.

Efforts from many other houses have ranged from selling T-shirts to allotting portions of donations from philanthropic activities.

"The Greek system has been the greatest thing for me of all time. People from my house and from other houses have been extremely supportive of me, and I couldn't thank them enough," Kyle said.

With his optimism riding higher than ever, Kyle continues to live each day, each experience and each memory as if it was his first, and not his last.

"Before [cancer], if it was between saving up for a car stereo or a trip, it would always be the material possession. Now it's changed to life experiences. I am now a strong believer that experiences are much more important than possessions," he said.

To purchase wristbands for the Kyle Charvat fund, contact CJ Bowles at cjbowles@u.washington.edu. For more information about Kyle's story, visit www3.caringbridge.org/wa/kylecharvat/