Cancer survivor Steven Danatos of Metuchen shares his story with others at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center’s cancer survivorship event. RICHARD DEWITT A U.S. Marine, corporate executive and nonsmoker, Metuchen resident Steven Danatos was a man who never asked for driving directions.
“I’m a Marine,” Danatos said. “I made it through Parris Island — I’m tough.”
But his life changed in the fall of 2009. After a cyst removal operation, Danatos woke up to see his girlfriend crying.
The mark on his neck was not a bug bite, as he first thought. Rather, it was a symptom from the cancerous cells on the base of his tongue.
Danatos, 59, shared his story with other cancer survivors, caregivers and medical professionals at the Memorial Sloan- Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC) celebration of National Cancer Survivor Day at the Bridgewater Marriott on June 6.
“I’m well aware of the challenges always facing health care providers,” said Danatos, a former vice chairman of the Raritan Bay Medical Center.
After coping with weeks of radiation and chemotherapy, a feeding tube and the side effects of treatment, Danatos cited nothing but gratitude for the “ecosystem” of care at the Basking Ridge MSKCC.
“Everybody knows who you are,” he said. “Every person I saw was there to cure me.”
“We offer team-based, multidisciplinary care,” Dr. Maureen Killackey of MSKCC said.
She explained that the center is dedicated to providing patient-focused care and has a range of medical specialists available at a convenient location for central New Jersey patients.
Danatos is thankful for the supportive network of family, friends and MSKCC doctors who helped him transition from cancer patient to cancer survivor.
“Rather than fear of a death sentence, I live today with an expanded appreciation of the life I have and a newfound respect for my own mortality,” he said.