Local Perspective

How much would you pay for one more day, one more month with someone you love?

By Petula Dvorak
September 13 at 2:09 PM

If someone you love is dying, how much are you willing to pay for just one more day with them? ... Doing the math, Melany Knott figured it cost about $1,100 a day. That got them 21 months. ... “No regrets,” Knott said. “I wouldn’t change a thing. And I won’t wonder about anything.”

The Knott family auctioned off chain saws, goats and guns to raise some of the $695,000 they spent. They raided their savings, college funds, maxed credit cards and doubled down on the double shifts. They did fundraisers at the county fair and ran online tote bag sales to pay for untested treatment offered at a medical clinic in Mexico.

This was not the battle for a cure to their 13-year-old daughter’s monstrous, fatal brain cancer. ... The doctors behind the mystery treatment have published zero studies on their findings and won’t even disclose the ingredients of the custom, chemotherapy cocktails. ... But the Knotts were willing to gamble. One more day. One more month with their child. Maybe, one more year, even?

This began 21 months ago, when the youngest of their four daughters, Kaisy, was having severe headaches. She was diagnosed with diffuse intrinsic pontine gliomas (DIPG), an aggressive, inoperable, incurable, 100 percent lethal brain cancer.
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Petula is a columnist for The Post's local team who writes about homeless shelters, gun control, high heels, high school choirs, the politics of parenting, jails, abortion clinics, mayors, modern families, strip clubs and gas prices, among other things. Before coming to The Post, she covered social issues, crime and courts. Follow https://twitter.com/intent/petulad