Help Rachel (39) Fight Stage 3C Rectal Cancer & Homelessness

I’m writing this on behalf of my dear friend, Rachel Smak—because she won’t ask you for help herself. But she’s fighting advanced cancer. And without help, she won’t survive.

Rachel has been diagnosed with Stage 3c, possibly Stage 4, rectal cancer. Her tumor is the size of a dollar bill. The treatment ahead—chemotherapy, radiation, surgery, imaging, labs, and multiple therapies insurance won’t fully cover—is daunting and expensive. And Rachel is facing it alone.

The truth is: cancer is only the latest in a string of devastating losses.

Rachel’s mother died by suicide in Rachel’s apartment. Rachel was the one who found her.

A few years later, her father slipped away to dementia. Three months after his death, her apartment flooded due to landlord neglect. Because of an insurance loophole she was left with nothing—her belongings destroyed, no compensation.

She moved to Idaho for love and hope—only for the relationship to collapse just as her cancer battle was beginning and she was set to start treatment. She is now facing homelessness.

She has no parents. No partner. No home of her own. She has lost all of her belongings except what little she could fit in her car. She has had to surrender her beloved dog. All this and she is fighting cancer alone.

Rachel hasn’t been able to fully work for an almost a year due to her health and has exhausted all her savings. She has had to shutter her business and is already behind on her car payments. Her car is her only way to get to treatment, and she needs help keeping it insured and on the road.

I’ve known Rachel for years. She is a gifted photographer, writer, and businesswoman. A woman who gave her time freely to others—working for free months during COVID to help keep small businesses alive, donating to crisis causes, lifting up her community.

She would never ask. So I am.

We are raising urgent funds to help Rachel cover basic living costs—housing, food, transportation—and the mounting medical bills that come with fighting cancer alone.

Every dollar counts. Every gift buys her another day of hope, another chance at life.

This is urgent. Please give what you can. And if you can’t, please share her story.

You can also follow her journey and her words at Cancer is a Gift