It’s shortly before 8 a.m. on a Wednesday, and a black Dodge Nitro pulls into the parking lot of the Florida Oncology Network office on North Orange Avenue in Orlando.

It’s junior internship week at Lake Highland Preparatory School last April, and today, 17-year-old Max Parker will shadow renowned radiology oncologist Dr. Michael Sombeck.

Parker follows Sombeck on his rounds and into his meetings — he sees patients fighting to live another day, intimate details of chemotherapy sessions and families watching their loved ones suffer.

By noon, Parker has seen it all. His decision has been made.

“I decided after a lot of mental answering and mental debating, I want to really embrace it and see what I can do,” Parker said.

That evening, Parker sits down on a couch across from his mother Kerry and tells her the gruesome details of his day.

“Mom,” he says. “This is what I want to do. I want to help these people.”

“Are you sure you want do this?” she asks. “Are you sure? Are you sure?”

“More than ever,” Max says. “I was made for this.”

Now a senior at Lake Highland (Orlando, Fla.) and a Syracuse men’s lacrosse commit, Parker has his sights set on more than just lacrosse fame. Regarded as one of the premier faceoff specialists in the country, Parker will arrive next year to try to answer Syracuse’s well-documented faceoff question.

But for Parker, a future biology major, it’ll pale in comparison to the other questions he hopes to answer in life.

***

Parker was the kid in elementary school who always put his arm around the student being bullied. In fourth grade, if a family member said he or she was feeling sick, Parker was on the Internet researching ways to treat it. As an undersized offensive lineman in middle school, he did everything he could to block Florida’s skilled pass rushers.

Anything he could do to lend a hand, he did. Parker was compassionate beyond his years.
In the summer before his junior year at Lake Highland, Parker’s friend Lucas Anderson was dying from osteosarcoma, the most common form of bone cancer, and was placed in hospice care.

On July 7, 2012, Parker and Anderson exchanged a series of Facebook mobile messages throughout the course of the day. Parker told Anderson that, with a career in oncology, he would always be on Parker’s mind.

The next day, Anderson died.

“That touched both him and I, big time,” said Sergio Salcido, a friend of Parker and Anderson’s and a current Syracuse midfielder.

The heartbreak continued.

In September 2013, Parker learned his ninth-grade English teacher Kimberly Miles had been diagnosed with breast cancer. Within hours, Parker texted Miles’ daughter Allie — a junior at Lake Highland — a simple message:

“I’m coming over and taking you for Italian Ices. No questions asked.”

The Miles family waited to leave for a planned vacation until Parker and Allie returned home.

In late January 2014, Parker heard the news that his science teacher Jill Smith had also been diagnosed with breast cancer.

“I ended up asking myself a lot of questions about why,” Parker said. “You know, I’m a religious person, and I asked myself, ‘Why does cancer exist? Why do bad things happen to good people?’

“Right then and there, it hit me — I could connect those together and make something beautiful happen.”

With the help of Susan Clayton, the Director of Development at Lake Highland, Parker came up with an idea to raise money for breast cancer research.

At the start of his junior season, Parker began raising money for every faceoff he won. The proceeds go to the Breast Cancer Research Foundation — an organization that donates 91 cents of every dollar directly to cancer research. Pledges range from a penny to $10 and to this point, Max has raised around $20,000.

“Let’s show how many people are affected by this,” Parker said. “Let’s show that Jill Smith and Kimberly Miles and I could list the names — that they’re not alone in this. We’re all behind every one of you.

“My life goal is to leave this world a remembered person. I remember thinking, ‘What can I do, on a smaller scale, but something I can do to leave a legacy before I go off to college?’”

***

During the first week of April, juniors at Lake Highland are required to take a three-day internship in a field he or she wants to pursue. Naturally, Parker chose oncology.

On Wednesday, Parker shadowed Dr. Sombeck in his radiation oncology office. On Thursday and Friday, he shadowed Dr. Robert Reynolds at the Cancer Institute of Florida.

“I just remember talking to these people and realizing how amazing and how strong they are,” Parker said. “They pull out this strength that’s not something you can describe with words. They almost become evolved forms of themselves, even more incredible then they already were. And that part fascinated me.

“I fight on for both of those people. And I fight on for all the ones that have been affected.”

One patient had been diagnosed with cancer during her pregnancy, but opted not to undergo chemotherapy because she didn’t want to harm the baby. When the woman met with Dr. Reynolds after she gave birth, Parker was in the room when she found out she had seven or eight months to live.

“The stories are just tragic,” Kerry Parker says. “But Max has continued on. He’s told me this: ‘If there’s one patient that he can help ease their life at the end, or reassure them, his life is made.’”

After one painful day with Dr. Reynolds, Kerry remembers Parker walking into her and her husband Steve’s bedroom around 11 p.m. Parker sat on the floor and started a casual conversation, but at times dosed off and fell asleep. Each time Kerry told Parker to go to his bedroom, Parker said he was fine.

After Parker fell asleep several times, Kerry relented. She got up and slipped a pillow underneath his head and threw a blanket over him. Although Parker was gone when Kerry awoke in the middle of the night, she and her husband realized that with whatever Parker had seen at the hospital that day, he didn’t want to be alone.

***

Lake Highland head coach Chris Spaulding was born in Horseheads, N.Y., and grew up a fan of Syracuse athletics. He knows the history and tradition of the SU men’s lacrosse program. More importantly, though, he’s one of the few people who knows both the program’s present and future.

Spaulding witnessed Parker evolve into one of the most talented high school faceoff specialists he’s ever seen. When Lake Highland lost the 2012 state championship game to St. Andrews School (Fla.) – a victory spearheaded by faceoff specialist Kyle Clemenza – Parker was buried on the depth chart.

But when Parker took over as the full-time specialist in 2013, the Highlanders beat St. Andrews 5-4 in a state finals rematch.

Parker knows Syracuse’s history, too. He watched Syracuse struggle at the faceoff X in last year’s national championship game against Duke, and was warned by Spaulding afterward that he would probably be getting a phone call from Syracuse sometime soon. Within a week, Parker was on the phone with Salcido, who had been told by SU assistant coach Lelan Rogers to reach out.

In August, Parker will join his buddy Salcido in Syracuse and immediately try to establish himself in the SU faceoff rotation.

As often as he is on the lacrosse field, though, Max will spend hours in the Center for Science and Technology and Life Sciences buildings, which he credits as one of the main reasons he’s coming to SU.
It’ll be in those buildings where Parker will put to use the oncology books that already lie on the backseat of his Dodge.

The diagnoses he was giving in fourth grade, those will soon become real.

“When I’m laying down on my death bed one day, I’ll look back knowing I gave it all I possibly had,” Max said. “Whether that be starting this research, being an oncologist, serving my community or winning as many faceoffs as I can for Syracuse University.

“It’s all just part of the plan that’s going to make me a happy person.”

Published on April 23, 2014 at 1:49 am

Contact Josh: jmhyber@syr.edu