Enjoying Life for Chris

Chris Hanners loved life and life loved him back. He was a warmhearted husband and father, a wonderful friend, and a mentor for many. Just days after the marriage of his only daughter, Josie, to long-time love Worth Bugg, he was diagnosed with cholangiocarcinoma, a rare cancer of the bile duct.

After starting a family in Honduras, the Hanners moved to Richmond to educate their three children and the couple had returned to the country’s Utila island paradise as empty nesters. “When they came back to Richmond for our wedding, Chris wasn’t feeling well, so it’s pretty lucky that his early diagnosis here helped prolong his life,” Bugg said. “The cancer was located in an area too small for surgery and the chances for survival were incredibly low. Chemotherapy would have given him six to 12 months, but without a good quality of life.”

Hanners opted for an experimental treatment and braved the pain for several months while he and his wife, Esther, lived with the newly married couple in Richmond. He seemed to improve and returned to Honduras, only to make more trips back to the States for continued treatment. He died 11 months after his diagnosis.

As Bugg watched his father-in-law go through the treatment process, he was amazed at the innovations in cancer care and research. He knew that had Hanners not elected to try the new treatments, the outcome would have been much different. “I think we got more time to spend with him and, at times, we felt like the cancer might even go away. It made it a little bit easier to deal with,” Bugg said.

For the third straight year, Bugg will form a team for the Massey Challenge, “Chris’ Caribbean Crazies,” to honor Chris Hanners. Last year, Worth raised more than $2,000 for Chris’ Caribbean Crazies, which as a team, totaled $3,697 in support of cancer research at Massey. “I thought this would be a good way to raise money and a fun way to remember him. He was a very competitive guy, but he always wanted to have fun. He was always laughing. I felt this was a perfect fit -- to get some friends and family together, including Josie’s brothers, Jonathan and Warren, and have fun.”

“Unfortunately, at some point someone you know will be affected by cancer. For me, I wish I knew about Massey well before Chris’ diagnosis,” says Bugg. “The opportunity to get involved with Massey is there, and if I had known that before, I could have started creating even more awareness.”

Worth Bugg’s personal experience gives him hope for the future of cancer research. “When I saw Chris and Esther listening and talking to the doctors, I saw the progress. Sometimes you don’t really see where research is going, but I was lucky to see what the doctors were doing.”