Support group

Mel's Diner owner Melissa Bales experiences all sorts of emotions as she deals with Stage III breast cancer. She said her family, employees and customers help her cope.

Teams of support

Story & photos by Cathy Spaulding

Restaurant owner Melissa Bales recalls how confident she felt before getting a mammogram on June 13.

"I went to the doctor by myself, no alarms, not thinking anything would come out of my mammogram," she said, recalling she had a clear mammogram a year earlier.

This time, Bales told them about a lump she had found in her left breast. "They did an ultrasound immediately," she said. "And then they found four other lumps. Their real concern was that it was already in my lymph nodes."

In August, Bales was diagnosed with Stage III breast cancer.

Bales, 54, had pulled through other challenges, including a house fire and major auto accident. She opened Mel's Diner in 2020, eight days before the COVID-19 pandemic hit, and kept it going it through the past two years.

Breast cancer is a new challenge altogether.

She said that, after her 2021 mammogram showed no problems, she didn't do monthly breast self examinations for a while.

After feeling what she thought were underwire bra problems, she felt a lump about an inch and a half thick in her left breast. June 13, Bales went to Cherokee Nation Three Rivers Health Center. "When they found something not normal, they

Melissa Bales, owner of Mel's Diner, pours gravy on mashed potatoes. She said she enjoys coming to work when she's not too fatigued.

said, 'Can you stay here? We need to get an ultrasound.' Next thing I knew I was being referred to the Warren Clinic in Tulsa," she said.

Then came the diagnosis. "I really didn't expect to hear cancer," she said. "I just thought it was a lump, it would be benign. They'd take it out and everything would be good."

Doctors first considered doing a lumpectomy, she said. "But because of the size of the cancer and it being in my lymph nodes, they're going to try to shrink it first, and kill the rest of it for it not to go into the rest of my body," she said, adding that the cancer remains limited to the breast and arm area.

In the few weeks since her diagnosis, Bales underwent surgery to put a chemo port by her breasts. She began weekly five-hour chemotherapy sessions a few days later, on Sept. 14. "The surgery went well. The chemo, I felt OK. I came to work both days," she said. "Thursday I was good, and Friday I was just sick to my stomach. I'm very fatigued more easily."

She said she worries about what's to come. "I just had one treatment and I feel horrible," she said. "The different things I know that's coming."

Bales said she's fortunate to have tribal health care. Treatments could run up to $900,000.

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Melissa Bales keeps reams of paperwork dealing with coping with and treating breast cancer. She was diagnosed in June.

"It's scary," she said, citing all sorts of emotions and concerns. "When this is gone, possibilities of it coming back."

In the meantime, Bales comes to the restaurant for long as she physically can. "Normally, I would be here in the early hours of the morning until 9 or 10 o'clock at night," she said. "Now, I might stay for a few hours, go home, rest, then come back when it's closing time."

Family, employees and customers remain on her mind and in her heart. "Knowing this affects me and my family, it also affects the restaurant," she said. "And I just want everybody to be patient and kind and understanding that if things aren't quite what someone feels they need to be, we're all going through this with me."

Bales said her daughter Brittany and her family are selling their home to move in with her. Another daughter, Kaylee, already lives with her. "This isn't going to be just a quick fix," Bales said.

What about Bales' 5-year-old grandson, Asher? "He knows that I'm sick, and that the doctors are going to make me better," she said.

The diner's 15 employees have taken on different new roles, filling in for Bales. "A lot of the people who work here are related to me," she said. "And even the ones that aren't

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Melissa Bales, left, appreciates support from employees, including Tatum Foster, who is enjoying a Mel's meat loaf.

my blood relation, they all love and care about this place, and me."

Customers are like family, offering an outpouring of spiritual and emotional support, she said. "It is just a warm feeling, that people have grown to care so much," she said. "I have a lot of love, my family friends, patrons, the doctors, the staff. I am so blessed to have what I have. I know I am not going to go through this by myself. I have that to give me strength."

Doctors and medical staff also have shown immense care, she said. "They take their time to explain things where your average person can understand."

Bales said belief in God is a huge part of her existence. "The Lord has blessed me. I'm already cured," she said. "It's just up to the doctors to get it out of my body."

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