Bill Dempsey: From the Operating Room to the Stands of Fenway Park
How Bill Dempsey’s lengthy journey with metastatic melanoma created a full-circle moment at Fenway Park for him and his family.
For years, the three Dempsey sisters (Emily, Goldey and Brooke) have sung the national anthem at Fenway Park before a Boston Red Sox game. They’ve grown accustomed to the nerves of singing in front of more than 35,000 people. They’re confident and comfortable. But, when they sang in 2022, one avid Boston sports fan was missing: their dad, Bill.
“Crazy as it is, they’re singing on a Friday night and [the doctors] decide that my emergency brain surgery has to be Friday night at 5 p.m.,” Bill Dempsey said.
Unsure of what would be next for their dad in an intensive surgery, Bill’s wife and daughters hugged him and said goodbye. As Bill was rolled into the operating room, the rest of the Dempseys headed to Fenway Park, just a few blocks from the hospital.
The sisters delivered an incredible performance for the crowd. Then, they waited for a call for when they could see their dad.
“I don’t know how they did it,” Bill said proudly. “My kids and my wife are just tough as nails.”
But Bill is tough too.
Bill’s Cancer Journey
Bill’s first experience with cancer came in 2015, when a doctor discovered melanoma on the back of Bill’s neck during a regular physical. The spot was removed, along with several lymph nodes, in a small operation. Following the surgery, Bill was cleared and underwent routine checks every three months for years.
In the fall of 2021, however, Bill developed a persistent cough that worsened into trouble breathing. A chest x-ray revealed two masses in his chest. At the time, Bill was living in Virginia, but after learning the results, he made appointments in his hometown of Boston.
Bill was seen at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston where another chest x-ray was taken.
“I walked around the corner and I’m met with a giant mass in my chest,” Bill said. “It literally looked like a cannonball in my chest. You don’t have to be a doctor to realize that’s not good.”
Bill came back a week later for a bronchoscopy and learned that the masses were metastatic melanoma in his lungs.
“The doctor comes and he’s like, ‘I can’t operate on you. It’s too big. There’s nothing I can do for you.’ and I was like, ‘But there’s something somebody could do, right?’”
Bill was referred to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, where they did full body scans revealing that the cancer was also in his brain – another shocking development. He shared the news with his daughters and began preparing for treatment in the coming weeks.
“That was the hardest part, me and my wife telling my three daughters,” Bill said. “It’s a weird feeling that you’re making other people around you feel bad. I didn’t want to tell my kids.”
Bill moved to Boston to begin treatment, living in an apartment adjacent to his sister and brother-in-law’s. He had to sleep on his left side, because the tumor was so large on the right that it would cut off his breathing. He was separated from his family, which was extremely difficult, but he was fighting as hard as he could.
“As soon as I went up there [to Boston], it was like the cancer knew. It just kind of took over – I started to feel bad.”
Bill started on an aggressive form of immunotherapy. He suffered through an allergic reaction to the medication and other severe side effects, resulting in a few extended hospital stays. Because of all of the side effects, his medical team paused his immunotherapy treatments and began radiation treatments. He had five radiation sessions on his head and five on his chest.
“The thing about cancer is there’s no blueprint,” Bill said. “You can’t go back and look, everybody’s different. So, I have no idea what I’m walking into. It’s like you’re pulled out of your real world and you’re dropped on an island.
“I would pretend that I was being interrogated. I’m not going to give up the information. I’ll take the a** kicking all day because I just kept telling myself it’s just pain. It’ll go away.”
Bill continued to have severe side effects that even left his medical team puzzled – insomnia, aches, and immobility, even grand mal seizures and a stroke. He was rushed to the hospital only a few days before his daughters were scheduled for the 2022 performance at Fenway Park that meant so much to them all.
“One of the things that I keep with me is a is a note from one of the doctors from the first day I was there. He says, ‘the patient is in the ICU because he’s facing inevitable death.’ That’s in my notes. I keep that because it didn’t happen.”
Bill was heavily sedated in the hospital as the doctors stabilized him preparing for surgery in the coming days. But, when he was alert, his mind always went to the approaching Red Sox game his daughters were scheduled to sing at.
The Dempsey sisters sang at Fenway Park that Friday night as their dad underwent emergency brain surgery. After a three-and-a-half-hour operation, and just moments after the girls stepped off the field, Bill’s wife received a call that all went well and they could go to see him.
Bill left the hospital on Monday, just days after the procedure. He had 22 staples in his head, had double vision and had to re-learn how to walk through physical therapy, but it was onto the next chapter.
When he left, he was on Keytruda (an immunotherapy drug), and the doctors started seeing success. The cancer was undetectable in his brain and shrinking in his chest. In January 2023, just six months after his brain surgery, he had a five-hour surgery to remove the mass from his chest.
Today, Bill’s scans reveal no signs of disease. He’s had maintenance treatment every three weeks for years, but in March 2026 his doctors decided to stop treatment, a tremendous milestone in his long journey.
Out to the Ball Game
Each year, Bill Dempsey has the opportunity to hear his daughters sing at Fenway Park once again. A full circle moment from years prior when he was in the operating room a few blocks away. With eyes swollen with emotion, he witnesses his daughters singing to a stadium filled with thousands of Boston fans.
Now, Bill’s passionate about sharing his story and advocating for cancer research. Being inspired by Jim Valvano, benefitting from research before him and donating his tissue after surgery, Bill’s long journey inspires the power of and urgency for more research.
“So, if you want to beat me up, poke me, whatever you got to do, I get it. I, and more importantly my family, was not going to break! We knew we were going to beat this cancer; we were going to beat it together. If I help somebody else down the road, that’s great, because somebody did it for me.”
