50/50 2011

Despite leading an extremely healthy lifestyle, which includes no smoking, no drinking, no drugs and not even possessing a driver's license to partake in what he considers the associated dangerous activity, twenty-seven year old Seattle Public Radio journalist Adam Lerner is diagnosed with a rare form of cancer. After getting over the initial shock of the diagnosis upon which he could not focus after the word "cancer", Adam reads online about his specific type - schwannoma neurofibrosarcoma - the article he reads which reports a 50% survival rate. His primary physician, Dr. Ross, prescribes a course of chemotherapy to shrink the tumor before they can even contemplate the dangerous surgery to remove the remainder of the malignant growth which is located on his spine. Beyond the variety of emotions Adam goes through related to his diagnosis and his treatment, he also goes through a range of emotions in relation to the help and support provided by the various people in his life. They include: Diane Lerner, his overbearing mother who he believes has become even more overbearing with this news, especially as her life is spent solely dealing with Adam's father's Alzheimer's; Rachael, his girlfriend, who had to decide whether to stay with him as they were just at point of taking their relationship to that next level or calling it quits when Adam was first diagnosed; Kyle, his SPR colleague and best friend, who tries to cheer Adam up by the positive, mostly in that Adam can get laid by anyone he wants by playing the sympathy card (and in turn Kyle can get his fair share riding on Adam's coattails); Alan Lombardo and Mitch Barnett, two older fellow chemo patients who become the human faces of cancer to Adam; and Katherine McKay, a twenty-four year old Ph.D. candidate who is assigned his psychological therapist, he who is only her third such patient which shows in her sometimes awkward but well meaning textbook actions.