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Gilda’s Club Louisville Brings
Its Mission To Southern Indiana
BY LISA HORNUNG | PHOTOS BY CHRISTIAN WATSON
IN DE C E MB E R 2015, A l a n He c h t o f
Leavenworth was in his mid-60s, enjoying his life
with his wife, children and grandchildren, when he
got devastating news: He had pancreatic cancer.
He had eight rounds of chemo, Whipple surgery
(a procedure to remove the head of the pancreas,
the first part of the small intestine or duodenum,
the gallbladder and the bile duct), then eight more
rounds of chemo, then 30 rounds of radiation.
The whole process took a toll on his life and his
marriage.
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“We were kind of getting after each other’s
throats,” admitted Hecht.
His wife, Jackie, did some research and found
Gilda’s Club, at 633 Baxter Avenue in Louisville.
The two went and were interviewed, and they
were placed into support groups that fit for their
circumstances. Jackie was put in a group of people
whose spouses were battling cancer, and Alan was
put into a group of people with cancer.
“And you start to realize that you can talk to
people on the same level as you with no barriers,
and you go, ‘Hey you’re not so unusual after
all.’ And what spouses do from the other side is
trying to help their spouse heal as well. They just
gave us a new sense, a new direction. Helped us
understand, hey we’re not so unusual, even though
we’re fighting all the same battle.”
Gilda’s Club was founded in 1995 by comedian
and actor Gene Wilder, the widower of comedian
Gilda Radner, who died of ovarian cancer in 1989.
Wilder teamed up with Joanna Bull, Radner’s
therapist, and movie critic Joel Siegel, who later