Finding a yellow lining

By Staci Dennis

Correspondent

LYNNHAVEN

For three years Catherine Miller has been in a fight for her life against leukemia.

She did double-duty prayer for more than year and found it hard at times to focus on her own recovery.

"It was hard to think about myself when my son was fighting a war in Iraq," said Miller, 48, who lives in the Malibu section of Lynnhaven. "It was extremely hard to deal with both things at once."

Miller's oldest son, Shawn White, graduated from Princess Anne High School in 2000. After going to college for a year with a football scholarship, he decided he wanted to come back home.

He spent time working in Ohio and then again in Virginia Beach before he enlisting in the Army in 2004.

"I wasn't doing anything productive with my life," he said. "My country was calling and I wanted to do something to better myself."

White, a combat engineer, was deployed to Iraq in April 2007. His main duty was to locate and remove Improvised Explosive Devices off the roads. While he was there, he found about 250 IEDs, he said.

"One out of every six found us," he said. "It was a job that took your total concentration."

For White, staying focused on his job was harder than usual.

Through MySpace, e-mails and phone calls, he tried to stay updated on his mother's condition. Miller also tracked her son the same way.

"I know if he had logged on his MySpace, then he was still alive," Miller said. "That's all I needed and I was able to get some sleep."

"While Shawn was in Iraq we called it, 'A mother fights for her life while her son fights for his county,' " said her husband, Mike Miller. "It was a hard time for all of us."

Catherine Miller was diagnosed with leukemia in 2005, only four months after her father died of the same disease. In 2006, she received her first stem cell transplant. In 2007, Miller relapsed and earlier this year, she underwent another stem cell transplant.

"All I could do was lay there and pray," Miller said. "It was a simple prayer, too: 'God, please let us both survive.' "

Frightening news came in the form of a phone call. White had been involved in an IED explosion, but he survived.

After her son returned to duty, Miller prayed even more. But White was involved in a second explosion.

"Thankfully, I walked away," White said. "I was one of the lucky ones."

It was when Miller received the third phone call about yet another IED explosion that her strength gave way.

"I fell to my knees in tears," she said. "I didn't know how much more I could take."

The third explosion left White with some nerve damage in his face, but he is on the road to recovery. He received the Purple Heart.

"I'm very proud of him and all he has done," Miller said.

White returned home in June and is serving the remainder of his time in the Army at Fort Lewis, Wash. In a year, when his time is up, he plans to return to Virginia Beach and attend Old Dominion University.

On his last day of leave, White and his family gathered on the front lawn to cut down the large yellow ribbon Miller had tied around a tree when White left in April 2007. White cut the ribbon as his mother held the bow.

That same day also marked 100 days post stem cell transplant.

"I'm doing really well," Miller said. "I feel a lot better."

For now, Miller plans to leave a candle burning in the window for the troops who are still serving in Iraq.

"We are a household of two heroes," said Mike Miller. "That's something to be proud of."

Staci Dennis, sdennis@cox.net