In 1989, Suzi Lee was having routine dental work done when her dentist, Ron Seeley, discovered a small bump on the roof of her mouth.

Seeley advised her to get a biopsy.

Lee was 28 years old at the time and had thought the bump was a wisdom tooth; she had no symptoms to indicate otherwise.

But it was a cancer called adenoid cystic carcinoma. Lee was shocked.

"It kinda hits you weird, 'cause you're not sick," she said. Lee went to Mayo Clinic where she had surgery. Part of her upper jaw bone and teeth on the left side of her face was replaced with a prosthesis. The doctors didn't guarantee Lee was out of the water yet.

And she wasn't. The cancer returned again 18 years later, in August 2007. At the time, Lee's prosthesis wasn't fitting correctly and she assumed it simply needed to be adjusted. But a tumor had developed again.

"I wasn't expecting that's what it was," she said.

This time, more surgery was done as well as six weeks of radiation. She stayed at the Mayo Clinic and healed well although it made her tired.

"There was no pain associated with it. It was hard to feel like I had cancer," Lee said.

Lee, a mother, farm wife and member of the New Public School District 8 board, is told "There's no new evidence" every time she has checkups at the Mayo Clinic. That's their way of saying there's no cancer, yet she's still not in the clear.

"They just know the nature of this cancer; it's likely to show up again," Lee said.

But Lee doesn't live her life in fear of the cancer coming back. She has her job as a mother, work on the farm with her husband, Myron, and her work on the school board to keep her busy. In fact, she jokes with her doctors when she goes to the Mayo Clinic for checkups: "I don't feel sick until it's time to come back here and see you guys."

Her daughter, Jaclyn, is in sports year-round and her son, Walker, keeps her hopping.

"That's kinda where my focus is. I don't want to worry about it (cancer). We do what we need to do to monitor it and live life the rest of the time. I believe God has a plan for me, and I don't want to stand in the way of it," Lee said.

Lee is humbled by the support of her friends and family throughout her battle with cancer.

"The support of your friends and family is so huge. I couldn't have done it by myself," she said.

Oral cancer is the Relay for Life focus cancer of 2010.

The Upper Missouri Relay for Life — part of the American Cancer Society's largest fundraiser — scheduled to take place in Williston on July 30 at Cutting Field in Williston.