Kids who've vanquished cancer just want to leave it behind

When Motty Reicher of Spring Valley suited up for the Bike4Chai bike-a-thon five years ago to raise funds for Chai Lifeline, he never imagined that within the year, his own teenage son would need the services of the organization he was pedaling away for.

This summer, Mr. Reicher again donned the ubiquitous blue and yellow jersey for the 100-mile route and raised the requisite minimum $5,000, but this time it wasn’t just a tzedakah drive. It was a ride of thanksgiving.

Because after a harrowing few years of surgeries and chemo treatments, tears and prayers and unchartered reserves of emunah and bitachon, Pinchas Reicher is now cancer-free.

I met Pinchas and his father earlier this year in Jerusalem, as part of a “graduation” group trip sponsored by Chai Lifeline, whose services provide emotional, social, and financial assistance to families and young patients with life-threatening or lifelong illnesses. For the 12 teens and parents on the tour, it was really a celebration of life, health, and reentry back into the world of “normal” — a culmination of months and years of chemotherapy, radiation, surgeries, as well as the loneliness and isolation that’s part of the overwhelming cancer journey in their battle for survival.

As the world in general had been living for months with the fear of deadly germs lurking at every corner, and as we’re all hoping that the worst is behind us and we’ll be able to shift back into a new normal and routine without sirens in the background and the constant dread of loss, these voices can give us a new perspective: how to transition from the catastrophic to the mundane, all the while realizing how fragile life really it. Because while teenage cancer often sidelines social relationships and academic achievement, frustrates the increased natural desire for autonomy from parents, and is fraught with fear of the unknown — making the already excruciating process of treatment even more complicated — these kids have kept their eye on the ball, pushing forward toward health without getting derailed by self-pity and hopelessness.