AFTER MULTIPLE TUMORS, JON SAARI IS THE PERFECT EXAMPLE OF ONLY FORWARD

The year was 2005. 

Jon’s youngest son had just recovered from sinus surgery. 

“I asked the doctor if maybe they got the sinus problems from me because I was getting what I thought was sinus headaches and pressure,” Jon said. “After a CT, the doctor told me that the good news was that I did not have to have sinus surgery, but I had a tumor that had attached to my pituitary gland.”

Jon immediately went to a specialist that informed him that the tumor could not be removed and that it sat below his optic nerve. So if he starts to have trouble seeing, the tumor is probably growing into his optic nerves.  

“Since the pituitary controls all the glands in your body, my tumor went to work,” Jon said. “First my thyroid quite working and then my testosterone production shut down. In 2007 they removed a mass the size of my fist from the left side of my chest and checked for others but did not find any.”

When he went in for his 1-month follow-up, he had grown a mass on the right side of his chest the size of a baseball. They performed surgery to remove it and checked throughout his chest for others. But when he returned again for the follow-up on that surgery, another mass had started to grow on the left side again.

“That’s when it was removed and it took half of my chest muscle with it,” Jon remembered. “That growth was the size of a softball and tissue was removed all the way down to my ribs. In 2014 my pancreas started shutting down making me Diabetic on insulin. When they diagnosed me Diabetic, I told the doctor that we better have this tumor beat since I am running out of glands to have shut down!”

The drive Jon has every day comes from knowing that no matter how much adversity he faces, someone out there is fighting a harder fight and not giving up. 

“So I can’t give up,” Jon said. “My wife and two boys have been my rocks through this all because they also do not allow me to give up or treat my any less than a normal person would be treated. I found APEMAN STRONG and automatically connected with the messages and sayings because it is all about fighting the good fight and never giving up.”

Jon’s favorite saying is ONLY FORWARD. When he took the bandage off from his chest from his third surgery, he saw the entire left side and that threw him for a loop.

“I could put my fist into it and count my ribs where my peck muscle was,” he said. “I broke down in my wife’s arms because a part of me was missing forever and that is not what she signed up for. She told me the only option we had was to move forward and get through this.” 

Still today, 5 surgeries later, they still only have one option and that is ONLY FORWARD.

“I am back in the gym getting stronger everyday living the fullest life that I can,” he said. “I’m proud to wear my APEMAN shirts to show everyone know matter how hard it gets or how bad it seems, there is only one choice and that is ONLY FORWARD.