The Power of Science, The Gift of Time

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The Power of Science, The Gift of Time

• February 15, 2025

I was ten years old, sitting on the side of my father's hospital bed, feet dangling and growing restless, when the doctor walked in. After a routine exam, he pulled up a chair and sat facing my father.

"Mitch," he said gently, "I have some difficult news. You have Stage IV lung cancer."

My father, a registered nurse, understood immediately. He asked just one question: "How long?"

The doctor sighed. "Not long. Six, maybe eight weeks. You should go home and get your affairs in order."

My father stared at him for a moment, then pointed at me. "Do you see that little girl?" he said. "I intend to see her graduate from high school."

Eight years later, I was in the long, lumbering line of graduates, marching to the familiar swell of Pomp and Circumstance. As I rounded the corner into the gymnasium, my eyes locked onto my father's. He stood along the aisle, a huge smile on his face, tears streaming down his cheeks.

From a young age, I understood that scientific research had given me those extra years with him.

Growing up just three miles from The Jackson Laboratory, I didn't know much about what went on inside that odd cluster of brick buildings, but I knew they studied cancer. And I understood, even as a child, that their work made new treatments possible-treatments that had given my father precious time.

He passed away six months after my high school graduation. But for those eight years, every moment, every milestone we shared, was made possible by science.

When my father returned for checkups, the doctors called him Mitch the Miracle Man because he had defied the odds. But even then, I knew the real miracle wasn't luck-it was people. The scientists, doctors, nurses and researchers who dedicated their lives to pushing the boundaries of what medicine could do.

I once thought I would become a doctor, but life led me in a different direction-one where my purpose is to help the world understand why scientific research matters and why funding it is essential. Today, I have the privilege of working to support the scientists at The Jackson Laboratory and the MDI Biological Laboratory as they work tirelessly, day in and day out, to make the world a better place.

But now, as science funding faces unprecedented and devastating cuts, I think about that ten-year-old girl, gripping her mother's hand, watching as the hospital elevator doors closed, taking her father away. I think about the weight of a terminal diagnosis, the devastation of feeling powerless. And I think about my father's sheer determination to fight for time.

As long as there is science, there is hope.

But funding cuts threaten to rob us of that hope. They threaten the progress that turns fatal diagnoses into treatable conditions. They threaten the breakthroughs that give other families more time. Every day, science moves us forward. Every day, we have new opportunities to create another Mitch the Miracle Man-another father, mother, or child who defies the odds.

We must protect that hope. We must invest in it. Because science isn't just about discovery-it's about life. And time. And love.

• cancer
• Funding
• science

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