Every Thursday, Guy Waltman walked out of his chemistry class at 1:50 p.m., got into the white minivan waiting outside and made the two-hour drive home to Nisakayuna, N.Y., with his sister, Kate.
They spent every weekend of last year’s spring semester with their father, Steve, each day moving them closer to the day the brain tumor would claim his life.
Hours before waking up on Christmas morning in 2010, Steve suffered a grand mal seizure. He had bitten down on his tongue and when he woke up, blood covered the pillows and sheets. On Dec. 26, he saw a neurologist in Albany and found he had a glioblastoma, a malignant brain tumor.
Then a freshman on the lacrosse team, Waltman took the season off. For the first time since he began playing lacrosse in eighth grade, it became secondary.
When Waltman was younger, he and his father spent countless hours playing catch in the backyard and basketball in the driveway. When he started playing lacrosse, Steve fed him passes.
But during Steve’s final six months, the tumor relegated him to the couch. Sixty to 70 pounds melted off his body. The muscle that once made him an imposing presence broke down and Waltman watched his father become an unfamiliar version of his former self.
They played chess instead. Chess was Steve’s game, but as he grew sicker, Waltman won almost every time. Steve took longer to make a move, sometimes as much as 30 minutes. Though frustrated, Guy always kept in mind a lesson he learned from his father: ‘You have to accept the shortcomings of others, but you never accept your own.’
Every Sunday after dinner, Waltman returned to Syracuse. He hosted a weekly radio show on Z89 with best friend Pat Smalanskas, a sophomore mechanical engineering major. Waltman turned to Smalanskas when he needed to talk about his father. Smalanskas created the Facebook page ‘Cards for Mr. Waltman,’ calling for get-well cards to the Waltman home. During the course of six months, at least 600 cards arrived, even from an elementary school in California.
In the final three months of Steve’s life, the tumor infected his thoughts. He lost control of his actions and words. A man who never cursed or raised his voice began to do so. He never put a hand on any member of his family, but toward the end of his life, he would often shove Waltman away whenever he came too close.
Donna Waltman watched her son become an adult overnight. For the first time in his life, Waltman had to control his father whenever he lashed out.
‘He was aggressive and angry,’ Donna said. ‘It wasn’t his personality at all. Guy had to be a little tough with his father at times just to help me out.’
Waltman wasn’t home the first time Steve acted aggressively. During his final months, several nurses took care of Steve at home. One day, Steve repeatedly pushed a nurse away. About 5-foot-9 and 230 pounds, he knocked out her tooth with the back of his hand.
Of everyone in his family, Waltman remained the most collected. His father’s best friend, Dave Zotta, said he rarely, if ever, showed his feelings about his father’s cancer.
‘He just dealt with it. I don’t know how – I was torn apart,’ Zotta said. ‘He was strong for his family.’
Desperate for answers, Waltman began researching the tumor that was killing Steve. On a pre-med track, he took a 15-credit course load of science and math. His science classes helped, but it was through hours on the Internet that Waltman deciphered the complicated medical language detailing glioblastoma and answered his family’s questions.
He also learned that Steve fought as hard as he could. Doctors gave him six weeks, but he lived six months. Steve died on Aug. 8. It was the first time Guy could take a breath.
Once back in Syracuse, Waltman threw himself back into classes and lacrosse. He devotes at least 20 hours per week to lacrosse and is also a founding member of the recently chartered professional medical fraternity, Phi Delta Epsilon.
Waltman wants to be a brain surgeon so he can one day tell another kid that the tumor on his parent’s brain isn’t fatal. When Waltman finishes his undergraduate degree at SU, he wants to attend medical school in Rochester at Strong Memorial, the same hospital that operated on his father.
For now, the wounds are still open. Donna told her children there will come a point when the pain will start to fade.
‘Time, I’m sure, is going to take care of it all,’ she said.
How long the grieving process will go on is unclear, but one thing is certain. Waltman will never let go of his father’s lessons.
That’s one shortcoming he could never accept.
cjiseman@syr.edu