Cathy Rucinski's page

This fundraising page was established for our much beloved friend Cathy Rucinski.

Cathy had to battle colon cancer 15 years ago which initially involved a nine day hospital stay, a major surgery to remove 90% of her colon and many, many follow up doctor visits.  This caused a financial strain on Cathy and Rob just after they had gotten married. Those of you that know Cathy and her family know that colon cancer is only one of many tragedies they have endured; more than any family should ever have to go through.

Now the unimaginable has happened to this family.  Cathy has yet another life challenge.  She has recently been diagnosed with stage 4 intestinal cancer that has spread to the liver.   After spending eight days in Loyola, she is now undergoing intense chemotherapy to hopefully shrink the tumors and then she will need to have yet another major surgery called a "whipple" in the fall.   

Through all of this, Cathy continues to be incredibly active as she "never sits still".  Cathy is the mother of four children, two of which are entrenched in sports, and the younger two only being three and four years old.  As you can imagine, her children demand much of her time and attention. Cathy also has the overwhelming task of trying to maintain a “normal” family life with her husband, Rob, and their four beautiful children.  Cathy is a beautiful light, whose love, laughter and warmth touches the lives of so many.  She is a vibrant, energetic, and talented woman who has accomplished much in her life and who has even greater things on the horizon.  Her dynamic spirit knows no bounds.  She is strong at the core, through and through.  We have every expectation that she will confidently face this challenge just as she has every other in her life.  And that we will see her back in the stands cheering her beloved Black Hawks to victory, while belting out the Chelsea Dagger, Chicago Black Hawks Goal Song!

Cathy and Rob have worked hard to keep positive and slowly recover financially.  This is going to be a long battle for them physically, emotionally and financially.  Most importantly they will need prayers and lots of them.  Our hope is to alleviate the financial burden the family will be facing.  They have already seen costs greater than $27,000 due to seeking expert care of her illness.  These costs are expected to rise greatly as she receives her treatments.  Our goal is to raise as much as we can which will help them with the daunting task of managing medical bills and experimental treatments that will not be covered by insurance. Please consider donating what you can to this beautiful family.