Gillette native Nathan Kissack, 36, likes to joke that he’s done fentanyl 25 times, and that he’s even done fentanyl and heroin together.
The drugs were all legal, however, part of what is now a third — and so far successful — fight with cancer.
“When you get a bone marrow biopsy they give you fentanyl,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “So, they give you, like, fentanyl and Versed. So, basically, fentanyl and heroin.”
Today, Kissack is taking life one day at a time, chilling with his cold nitro-coffee, hanging out with his friends and listening to good music — some of it made by his friends on an album he himself produced.
His spirits are exceptionally good for someone who has been through cancer twice already and is now on his third go-round. He’s fresh off the latest six-month checkup, which doctors told him looked really good. He’s got his fingers crossed that the third time really is a charm.
Feeling Out Of Shape
Things haven’t always looked as rosy as they do now. Kissack’s first round with cancer came on quite unexpectedly and nearly killed him in 2018.
He was haying on property that his parents lease for their ranch near Gillette one summer day, a task that’s among his least favorite.
“I’ve always hated haying because you just kind of drive around in a circle with your own thoughts at 3 miles an hour,” Kissack said. “And so, I was doing that, but I was running this piece of equipment called the hydroswing, and I was looking over my shoulder, seriously, 1,000 times a day.”
His back became so uncomfortable from doing that, he thought he must have thrown it out again. So he called up a chiropractor friend, lifelong pal Miles Fortner, and scheduled an appointment.
A session with Dr. Fortner would usually have done the trick for Kissack, but not this time.
“He texted me after that, and he’s like, ‘Hey, you feel any better? Like how’s your back?’” Kissack said. “And I told him he sucked at his job — we just kind of trash talk to each other. But I was like, ‘Dude, I feel worse. Like, I don’t know what happened.’”
Fortner suggested Kissack come by during lunch for an X-ray, and Kissack agreed.
When he’d finished up the morning’s work, he got out to open a gate and was reminded of one more thing he hates about haying — how out of shape it makes him feel.
Spending hours sitting around in a tractor is just not something a gym rat would ever choose to do.
“So, I just thought that I was kind of a piece of trash when I was getting out of the tractor and opening gates and stuff,” Kissack said. “I was starting to sweat, and I was like, ‘Man, you’re just so fat and out of shape.’”
Or so he thought.
In reality, his lungs were filling up with fluid and getting ready to collapse.
Left: Taken the day Nathan Kissack was admitted for the third time for cancer. He did a week of chemo that time, but didn't tell anyone else but family and his girlfriend at the time. Right: Transplant day at Anschutz Hospital in Aurora. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Left: Photo Nathan Kissack took of himself while fighting off graft versus host syndrome. Kissack had a 106-degree fever told Cowboy State Daily he could barely hold his phone. He took the picture to remind himself, if he survived, that if this doesn't kill him, then nothing else can kill him. Right: Nathan Kissack, at left, poses with his dad Bart, who is donating his stem cells to his son. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
The IV bags from the latest battle with cancer. They started to write "Victors Not Victims" on the bags for him. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Left: Nathan Kissack holding Pickle Rick. He comes from what Kissack described as this "ridiculous animated show" called Rick and Morty. It was a gift from his girlfriend at the time, to sleep with when she wasn't there. Right: Nathan poses for a photo shoot outside the hospital the first time he had cancer. Kissack told Cowboy State Daily he knew what was coming, so he had a unicorn puking into a vomit bag they'd given him. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Chemotherapy brought on a dramatic physical change, left. But forefoot, Nathan Kissack donated his hair to a charity that makes wigs for sick kids, right. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack)
Misdiagnosed
After getting the X-ray, Kissack’s friend urged him to go straight to an emergency room.
“He had everything set up for me when I showed up there,” Kissack said. “But they misdiagnosed me with testicular cancer.”
Initially, Kissack just wasn’t going to tell anyone what was going on.
“I thought that I could just kind of have that testicle removed and just go on from there and like have a good joke to tell at parties,” Kissack said.
He moved back home after that, which probably saved his life.
“My mom took videos of me one day while I was taking a nap, because I wouldn’t breathe for really, really long periods of time,” Kissack said.
She took him back to the ER after showing him the video, insisting that something had to be wrong.
Kissack recalls that the doctors tried to release him, but his mom wouldn’t let them because her son’s skin was turning blue.
“And then my lung collapsed in the lobby, and they had to puncture a hole in my ribcage,” Kissack said. “And I had what’s called a pleural effusion, which is buildup of liquid between your ribcage and your lungs.”
Doctors pulled 2 liters of fluid from Kissack’s lungs. A more normal amount would be 2 tablespoons.
That’s when doctors discovered a mediastinal tumor on the outside of his lungs. Mediastinal tumors are usually benign, but not this one.
Kissack spent 10 days in the ICU, then went to Denver for another 100 days.
“I started chemotherapy down there, and that was pretty intense,” he said.
Because of the mass on his lungs, Kissack’s chemotherapy line had to be fed in through his femoral artery, an unusual approach. That had about 100 nurses asking if they could see how his femoral PICC (catheter) line was done.
“UC Health is a teaching hospital,” Kissack said. “There were, like, 15 nurses every day coming into see this femoral PICC line. And I mean, I don’t know how to say it, but it’s maybe a half an inch away from your testicles.”
That felt a little weird, Kissack said, but he let them see it, and even take photos.
Eventually he returned to Gillette, and the chemotherapy turned into one day every three weeks. Finally, he hit maintenance chemo, one day every 28 days.
One thing he tells everyone after that first harrowing experience is to stay healthy and stay in shape.
“You just never know what’s going to happen,” Kissack said. “And the fact that I was in such good shape when I got diagnosed probably saved my life.”
Music Makes The World Better
Those healthy habits helped Kissack bounce back quickly after his first dance with death.
But the whole experience had him really thinking about his life and what he wanted to do with it.
“I kind of realized that I didn’t want to just ranch for the rest of my life,” he said. “I wanted to travel more and just, with ranching, you can’t leave very often. I didn’t want to do that.”
So, he followed a girlfriend out to California and found an audio engineering and production school called Studio West.
“I have been involved in music for a really long time, and I’ve always thought that Wyoming has a great music scene,” Kissack said. “There just aren’t a lot of people talking about it. And we just don’t have the people to necessarily, like, get a bunch of big bands.”
One of Kissack’s school projects required him to release a single, and that’s when he realized he had the perfect excuse to get all of his musician friends to come out and visit — a compilation album featuring Wyoming musicians.
“I would just have those guys come out for two or three days, and they would just live with me,” Kissack said. “And it was so insane during COVID that having all of those guys out there just really kept me grounded. It kept me from completely losing my mind.”
Sam Riggs, Kolton Moore Connection
To give the record a little more kick, Kissack also convinced Texas singer-songwriters Sam Riggs and Kolton Moore to each do a song for the album.
Riggs’ song “Breathless” debuted at No. 12 on Billboard Country Albums chart, selling 3,800 copies during the first week after its release.
Kolton Moore and the Clever Few is well known for their blend of rock, country, folk and Americana, with powerful vocals and skillful instrumentals that have been making the band increasingly popular.
“Sam Riggs has been a great friend to me for a really long time,” Kissack said. “And I met Kolton Moore at the Cowboy in Laramie a couple of years before, and we became friends.”
All artists on the album got their own songs, as well as being featured in one song all together.
Kissack held a live concert in Laramie to release the album, turning it into something of a victory party.
His family sold L Bar 7 Ranch gear in a style that Kissack describes as Country Metal to raise money for medical expenses and to benefit other cancer patients.
“Like, I grew up on a ranch, but I always liked hardcore music and stuff like that,” Kissack said. “So, it’s kind of tattoo themed, and it’s got like cowboy skeletons, hanging Grim Reapers or just a bunch of ways to stiff-arm death, and it says, ‘victors not victims,’ and stuff like that.”
The concert and the sale of ranch gear were Kissack’s way of avoiding crowdfunding.
Photo of Nathan Kissack taken on the L Bar Rranch. This was part of family photos taken for Christmas, and because Kissack still had hair at the time. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Nathan Kissack on a celebratory trip with a couple of friends on Cloud Peak in the Big Horn Mountains. Taken the second time Kissack beat cancer. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Nathan Kissack looking out over everyone at the Cowboy Bar in Laramie where Kissack held a release party for an album full of Wyoming artists, and his friends Sam Riggs and Kelton Moore. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Photo of Nathan Kissack, taken at 6 a.m. on the top of Medicine Bow peak. Kissack went with several L Bar 7 ranch people. Kissack said it was just before going to the hospital again, and he just wanted to do something hard before that. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Nathan Kissack with his dog Nightlinger which, ironically enough, died of cancer right after Kissack beat cancer the second time. Taken the day before Kissack moved to San Diego to start audio school and move in with a girlfriend. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Title of the single on the album Nathan Kissack produced, which features all the artists on the album. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Nathan Kissack, left, with Sam Riggs on a Moab canyoneering run. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Kenny Fiddler and the Cowboy Fiddlers with Nathan Kissack at the Sheridan during a benefit for Kissack. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Nathan Kissack, left, in San Diego with Kellen Smith just after Smith finished recording the song, "Till I Die." It was a celebration of the successful recording. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Nathan Kissack, right, with his dad, Bart Kissack, left. Taken at the second benefit thrown for him at the Mint Bar in Sheridan. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Cowboy Bar setup for album release party. Taken by a guy named Jake Zielke. It was Zielke's very first show as a photographer, videographer. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
A group of friends pick Nathan Kissack up during an annual customer appreciation party. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack) 
Left: Celebrating life at Hidden Falls in the Big Horns: Right: Taken a year after Nathan Kissack was put on maintenance chemo. Kissack told Cowboy State Daily he just made up a competition for himself, to see what kind of dramatic physical change he could make happen with his body after being told by doctors not to work out. (Courtesy Nathan Kissack)
Forget The Naps And The Cake
But the victory celebration proved premature. Three or four months after he’d been off chemo, his medical health numbers started looking worse.
This time a biopsy showed that he had a rare and aggressive form of leukemia.
Doctors told him the cure rates for that particular leukemia were high, and Kissack was able to put that one behind him fairly quickly.
Then he got an entirely different kind of leukemia, one that required a bone marrow transplant with a donation from his dad, as well as an umbilical cord donation from Great Britain.
For that treatment, he eventually moved to Fort Collins for what has been the hardest fight yet. Through it all, Kissack has kept his cowboy mentality — sometimes against the advice of doctors.
“They tell you a lot of stuff when you’re in the hospital,” Kissack said. “And you’re likely to believe them, and you’re just scared because everybody’s telling you you’re going to die all the time.”
But Kissack kept right on eating red meat, and he took walks around the block as often as he could.
“I would be out there in flip-flops and a gown with the chemo pole,” Kissack said. “Just walking around Colfax Avenue, freaking everyone out. I felt like being out in the sun and exercising and that ‘victors not victims’ mentality is what I want to pass on to people.”
Don’t Coddle Cancer Patients
People are just too nice to cancer patients, Kissack said.
“They give you a lot of excuses and tell you to eat cake and just lay down and take naps,” he said. “And I think everybody’s capable of a lot more than that, if you decide that you’re not going to lay there and feel sorry for yourself all day.”
Kissack is still taking things one day at a time, but he’s feeling a lot of love lately after his brother started a GoFundMe for him on the sly.
“It just felt, especially since I didn’t ask for it, like a lot of love,” Kissack said. “And it was really overwhelming.”
Kissack was at a going-away party for a comedian at a Denver nightclub one of his friends owns when he found out what his brother had done.
“I just had to go to my car and cry,” Kissack said.
Love like that, Kissack knows, is a precious gift. As is life itself.
Renée Jean can be reached at renee@cowboystatedaily.com.
