Ellen Butterfield and her husband Chas Eisner.

Ellen Butterfield

disguise caption

toggle caption

Ellen Butterfield

Ellen Butterfield and her husband Chas Eisner.

Ellen Butterfield

This story is a part of the My Unsung Hero sequence, from the Hidden Brain crew. It options tales of individuals whose kindness left a long-lasting impression on another person.

In October 2001, Ellen Butterfield and her husband, Chas Eisner, had been driving residence to Los Angeles from Tijuana. They had gone to Mexico to select up chemotherapy medication for Eisner’s metastasized colon most cancers.

Butterfield had the treatment in a plastic bag in her purse. It was eight little bottles of white powder — which raised alarm bells on the border.

“It looked a lot like anthrax, which people were really terrified about,” Butterfield mentioned.

So earlier than they may cross again into the United States, they had been taken to a big auditorium filled with X-ray machines and guards in uniforms.

“And suddenly, both Chas and I were really panicked,” Butterfield recalled. “I was afraid that they would just confiscate these drugs and not let us take them home. And then Eisner’s one chance at maybe beating the cancer would be gone.”

Butterfield reluctantly put her purse on the conveyor belt. Just as she had feared, when the official noticed the plastic bag filled with bottles, he informed them to take the bag throughout the auditorium, to a different border official seated at a desk.

“He was enormous, really scary-looking,” Butterfield remembered. “And I gave him the bag, and he took two of the little bottles out of the bag.”

He then reached again into the bag and took out the physician’s prescription order. He studied it for what felt to her like an hour, although it was most likely only a few seconds.

“Then this huge man reached out for Chas’ hand, and he smiled. And he said, ‘You know, my dad had cancer. And he had to take all them chemotherapy drugs, too.'”

“And then he looked very closely at Chas, and he said, ‘And he’s still alive.'”

After that, the border official turned to the individuals in line behind them, and so they had been free to go. Butterfield and her husband had been in shock. As quickly as they bought exterior, they cried and hugged one another in aid.

“That man had looked so frightening. But he was so gentle and he was so kind,” Butterfield mentioned. “And it was like a lesson for us that, you know, you never know who a person really is by just how he looks.”

Butterfield now lives in Studio City, California. Eisner lived one other 10 months, till August 2002.

My Unsung Hero is also a podcast — new episodes are launched each Tuesday. To share the story of your unsung hero with the Hidden Brain crew, file a voice memo in your cellphone and ship it to myunsunghero@hiddenbrain.org.