She was worried she wasn’t going to dance again, so the night before Susan Burns had her leg amputated she danced like it was her last time.
Despite losing her leg after a cancer diagnosis at age 26, Burns still loves to dance.
In 2016, 34 years later, she was diagnosed with cancer again, it was an unrelated cancer in her blood. This cancer is chronic, meaning it will never completely go away.
Her son Joe Burns wrote a song after her second cancer diagnosis. Joe is musician outside of his job as a principal at Centennial CVI high school.
The Gift, about his mom’s journey with cancer, her husband’s support and the generations of the Burns’ family she got to see grow up is embedded in the lyrics and music video.
Here are some of the lyrics from Joe's song The Gift to exemplify the moment before her surgery during her first battle with cancer:
"She asked for one gift/Her life to be lived just a little bit longer/The purest request/A chance to raise one son and one daughter/And on the night she asked/She danced."
His mom was diagnosed with a type of bone cancer when he was a toddler. Joe remembered as a young child the cast his mom had wore on her leg before they knew it was cancer. She fought and won her battle.
When she was going through cancer for the second time at age 60 she worried she would lose her arm and lose some of her independence, Joe said.
Joe had got a call that his mom broke her arm reaching up to grab a glass from the cupboard. She had surgery and did not lose her arm, it's just a little shorter, her son said.
His mom always joked to him and asked, “when are you going to write a song about me?”
“She prayed having two young kids that she would be allowed to live to see those two kids grow,” said Joe.
“I think in her mind she got to watch us grow up, and now is going to be her time,” he said, when his mom was diagnosed with cancer for the second time.
Joe didn’t want this to be her time, she has four grandchildren now. She had her prayer to watch her children grow up and now “it’s almost like the song is the next prayer,” he said.
For Susan, hearing the song for the first time was emotional, said Joe. Hearing it now it is a happier occasion, Susan and her husband Steve dance to it.
Once Joe made the music video, featuring photos of his family growing up his father wanted friends to see it because they would understand it since they were around when his wife was going through cancer.
To raise money for the Canadian Cancer Society Joe is encouraging people to buy his song on bandcamp where the proceeds will go to the cancer research. The song is listed at $1 but people can purchase it for more, if they want to donate more.
“My mom has always thought if she had the same cancer she had when she was 26, with all the advances that have happened, would she even have lost her leg?” said Joe. “It’s not a regretful question, it’s a hopeful one.”
Joe said he knows the song is specific to his family’s journey but “... it’s so many people's story.”
