Hi, my name is Tasha and I am a really good friend of Brenda. I met Brenda when I was 17 years old and she has been like a second mother to me. A little over 10 years ago she was diagnosed with breast cancer and beat it like the fighter that she is. She had a lumpectomy as well as chemo and radiation. Fast forward to a few months ago she was complaining of shortness of breath. She went in for a CT scan which showed there was a spot on her lung that needed to be biopsied. A few days later we got the fateful news that it was indeed cancer. Her care team decided that they wanted to remove the lung, but prior to she needed to do some rehab to strengthen the other lung. She did two months of rehab and then went in for the surgery. Once the surgeon opened her up they realized it was too risky because she had lots of veins wrapped around the tumor so they closed her back up. It was decided the best course of action at this point would be chemo and radiation to shrink the tumor. The first few days went just fine however, her body is not doing well with the chemo. Her kidneys have started to function poorly and her numbers are not really moving. They have stopped chemo and at this point she is only doing radiation. Her job does not offer any short term disability, she exhausted all of her PTO while doing pulmonary rehab, and she has depleted her saving being off doing daily radiation. Brenda has a very carefree spirit and ALWAYS has a smile on her face. Brenda has patients that stop in to see her at the clinic just to get "a Brenda hug" when they are having a bad day. Brenda will give you the shirt off her back if you asked her for it and she would never talk about it after. With as much as she has done for those around her it is time for us to give back to her. Any donation will help, all proceeds will go directly to her to help pay her mortgage, medical bills and groceries