Rick Bender shares story of suffering oral cancer

At the age of 12, then California resident Rick Bender, who has been nicknamed "the man without a face," started a habit of using spit tobacco.

Bender came to Alleghany March 18 and told Alleghany students about how his addiction changed his life. Speaking to students at Alleghany High School, Bender said peer pressure was one of the factors that drew him into the world of tobacco.

He recalled that friends would smoke cigarettes before and after school.

"I never smoked; I didn't want anything to do with cigarettes. My parents taught me (it) could cause emphysema…it would make you sick." While Bender made the decision not to smoke, he noted that the peer pressure surrounding tobacco use remained strong through television advertisements.

Bender said, "Back in the ‘70s when I first started to do this, the tobacco companies had commercials on television and they had these professional athletes (including) Walt Garrison. Back in the ‘70s, this guy played football with the Dallas Cowboys. He was as popular as Tiger Woods or Peyton Manning is today. I remember Walt on TV holding a can of Skoal spit tobacco with a smile with a big advertisement, "Take a pinch instead of a puff."

When baseball player Bender started high school, he commented he was going through a can of chewing tobacco about every three or four days.

"By the time I finished, I was having a can every other day," commented Bender. "In February 1988 though, my habit had easily increased to a can a day of spit tobacco, if not more. Right around February of '88, I also noticed a little sore on the side of my tongue. It was a little bitty white bump, and you know, I didn't really think too much about it because every once in a while I'd see bumps on my tongue, this was something like acne, they all kind of hurt for a bit. Got these little sores and irritations, they'd just kind of come and they'd go…I'd just ignore it."

Springtime of the year came around and the sore had remained in his mouth. He told those in attendance that it was at that time he began thinking to himself, "You know Rick, you're going through two cans of this stuff a day. Those little sores haven't healed up and haven't gone away. Maybe it's cancer." After a brief pause, Bender continued, "Nah, it can't be. Nobody in my family'd ever had cancer...."

After thinking the matter over, Bender said he realized that he had continued his use over a period of time and not allowed the sores to heal. Eventually, he opted to stop using spit tobacco.

Despite the fact he discontinued use of the product, around Christmas of 1988, Bender found that the sore in his mouth had returned and had grown in size.

"It was about the size of a dime inside my tongue," Bender remarked of the sore. "This thing hurt. I couldn't eat; it was rubbing across my teeth. It was Christmas. I wasn't going to tell my wife and my folks over the holidays about this sore."

Action Finally Taken

As the year 1989 began, Bender said he could no longer endure the pain and went to a family doctor.

"He just out and out told me, ‘Rick, I don't know what to do for you.'" He was then referred to an ear, nose and throat doctor.

Recalling his first visit, Bender stated, "At first, I didn't care for Dr. Sheets at all…He tells me to open my mouth and picks up these cotton swabs, he grabs my tongue and pulls it out and off to the side so he can look at the sore and he's shaking his head."