news-record.com

Taylor Bell wants to become a professional lobbyist after she graduates from East Carolina University with a political science degree in May. Why not? She's doing pretty well as an amateur.

Two weeks ago, she walked into Sen. Kay Hagan's Washington office and left with the Greensboro Democrat's promise to co-sponsor the bill that Bell was promoting.

Before you associate Bell with negative stereotypes about lobbyists, listen: She's a 23-year-old former star soccer player ... and lung-cancer survivor.

S 332, the bill Hagan promptly signed on to at Bell's request, is called the Lung Cancer Mortality Reduction Act of 2009. Among other provisions, it would expand research and prevention programs with the goal of cutting very high mortality rates by 50 percent by 2016.

Research and prevention? Doesn't everyone know what causes lung cancer?

Not in every case. Bell never smoked, but she developed a tumor in her lung that wasn't properly diagnosed when she was first examined.

"I was a big, big, big-time soccer player," the Wilmington native said in a phone interview last week. "It was my life."

As a high-schooler, she made an Olympic development team of the state's top 20 players. As a freshman at East Carolina in the fall of 2005, she competed on the varsity soccer squad.

"I wasn't starting, but I was getting playing time," she said. "Everything was going fine."

Then she began to experience tingling and numbness in her toes. Her stamina lagged. For the first time, she couldn't complete a fitness test of 10 120-yard runs in less than 18 seconds each. By Christmas, she was in too much pain to play anymore, but MRIs of her head and back didn't find anything.

The next year, she came down with pneumonia. "I thought I'd gotten hit in the ribs," she said. At student health services, she had a chest X-ray. A physician's assistant told her she had a spot on her lung but attributed it to the pneumonia. He gave her an antibiotic. Bell continued to feel sluggish but "thought it was college kid stuff."

Until October 2007, when she was struck with pain so severe she thought she had appendicitis or a cracked rib. A CT scan showed her left lung was collapsed and found a 3-4 centimeter tumor there. It was later diagnosed as a carcinoid -- lung cancer.

After surgery to remove a portion of her lung, Bell says she's cancer-free: "I'm good to go. There's an 85 percent chance it won't return."

She resumed her studies, works out and pushes for lung-cancer awareness.

People don't expect someone with lung cancer to look like Bell. "I'm cute, I'm skinny, I'm athletic, I'm a survivor," she said. "No one deserves to go through what I've gone through."

That message hit home with Hagan.

"It was an awesome experience," Bell said of her meeting with the senator, which was arranged by the Lung Cancer Alliance.

"Sen. Hagan immediately recognized me" because Bell and Hagan's daughter, Carrie, had played soccer against each other on traveling teams as teenagers.

Dusty Donaldson of High Point, also a lung-cancer survivor, attended the meeting.

When Bell told her story, Donaldson said, Hagan "was moved by compassion. You could see a mother's heart in Sen. Hagan, like 'This could be my daughter.' "

When Bell asked Hagan to co-sponsor the bill, Donaldson added, the senator said, " 'Well, of course I will.' It was really sweet. We all just hugged and thanked her."

Hagan recalled it as an emotional meeting. "I made sure I had a box of tissues out," she said Tuesday.

Later, Bell secured the support of her congressman, Rep. Mike McIntyre, for the House version of the legislation. And, at Donaldson's personal urging, Rep. Howard Coble also has become a co-sponsor.

Donaldson says the merits of the legislation are obvious, but the right messenger is important. Bell puts a sympathetic face on a disease that too often is shoved aside as a penalty for smoking.

"Taylor Bell was the perfect face for this senator," Donaldson said of the meeting with Hagan.

"Taylor is an incredible spokesperson for lung-cancer survivors," Hagan affirmed. "She can really articulate the need for research."

The former soccer player already is covering a lot of ground for her cause. Last week, she attended a cancer-related event in San Francisco. Much more of that is in her future.

"This is her calling in life," Donaldson said.