{"id":215208,"date":"2026-03-22T07:43:09","date_gmt":"2026-03-22T07:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/215208\/"},"modified":"2026-03-22T07:43:09","modified_gmt":"2026-03-22T07:43:09","slug":"mindset-from-the-start-young-lamesa-man-celebrates-end-of-cancer-battle-with-bell-ringing-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/215208\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Mindset from the start:\u2019 Young Lamesa man celebrates end of cancer battle with bell-ringing"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text\">LUBBOCK, Texas (KCBD) &#8211; JJ De La Fuentes is celebrating the end of one long journey and the start of another, after overcoming bone cancer. On the other side of surgeries and hospital stays, he rang the bell Monday at UMC surrounded by family and friends.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">He was surprised to see a long line of his supporters from family to friends from his hometown Lamesa, to his care team at UMC, in the McInturff Conference Center. They all cheered him on as he walked toward the bell signaling the end of his journey.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cA little overwhelmed, being honest with you. But, no I mean, this was the mindset from the start, to have this party to celebrate it. It was never a mindset of whether if I\u2019m going to live this out or not, it\u2019s a mindset of the process and how long it\u2019s going to be,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">De La Fuentes was diagnosed in the middle of his senior year at Lamesa High School. His classmates helped organize a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.kcbd.com\/2025\/05\/21\/lamesa-high-school-seniors-celebrate-one-their-own-with-pop-up-senior-walk\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.kcbd.com\/2025\/05\/21\/lamesa-high-school-seniors-celebrate-one-their-own-with-pop-up-senior-walk\/\">senior walk<\/a> for him at UMC before graduation last May.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">He received treatment in Lubbock and at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, saying his faith helped push him through the process.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cMy faith, my faith in the Lord, simple as that. It\u2019s what I rely on. Of course, I\u2019m human. I\u2019m going to have my days. I\u2019m going to have my worries. But I always go back to the Lord, pray, have faith in Him, and that\u2019s what holds me together,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">De La Fuentes said his community wasn\u2019t just there to celebrate the end of his journey, but has walked alongside him throughout it.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cEveryone pitched in financially, or if not, they\u2019re always checking up on me. When I had surgery, people made trips all the way to Houston just to come and stay with me for a couple of hours. Every single person here has played a role, and I\u2019m so blessed that they\u2019ve been in my life,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Now cancer-free, Fuentes plans to pursue a nursing degree at Lubbock Christian University.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cSo hopefully with physical therapy, I\u2019ll be more independent by the fall, and I\u2019ll be doing in-person classes and all that at Lubbock Christian,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">His goal is to one day work at MD Anderson, treating patients like himself, and encouraging them days of celebration like this one are possible.<\/p>\n<p class=\"copyright |\">Copyright 2026 KCBD. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LUBBOCK, Texas (KCBD) &#8211; JJ De La Fuentes is celebrating the end of one long journey and the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":208142,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[48369,14891,21750,7990,2622,27405,18429,4118,447,25101,1881,541,7479,36210,36223,1822,81663,6169,70759,168,170,169,97,32989,81664,20360,236,81665,81666,2142,9122,20373,512,47763],"class_list":["post-215208","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-lubbock","tag-battle","tag-bell","tag-bone","tag-brittany-crittenden","tag-cancer","tag-celebrates","tag-cheer","tag-christian","tag-community","tag-end","tag-faith","tag-family","tag-fight","tag-friends","tag-hometown","tag-hospital","tag-jj-de-la-fuentes","tag-journey","tag-lamesa","tag-lubbock","tag-lubbock-headlines","tag-lubbock-news","tag-man","tag-md-anderson","tag-mindset","tag-nurse","tag-of","tag-overcome","tag-ringing","tag-support","tag-surgery","tag-umc","tag-university","tag-young"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215208","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215208"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215208\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/208142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215208"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215208"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215208"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}