Hope for Esperanza: Cancer Fund
Donation protected
It was April 18, 2017. I was on the phone with my mom when she met with her doctor to go over the results of her CT scan. She had been dealing with a cough that wasn’t resolving and even after treating her pneumonia it wouldn’t get better. It had been a year prior to that that she had been coughing up blood also. We never thought that her pneumonia and her coughing up blood would ever be related. It was in the doctor’s office where we were able to understand the cause of her symptoms. The CT scan had shown there were large lesions in her right lung and cancer had already started invading her lymphatic system. She had been diagnosed with Non-Small Cell lung cancer. Hearing my mom sob over the phone will be something I will never forget.
Staging was still not clear at the moment and she had to undergo many more tests. Unfortunately, the medical care she was receiving in Los Angeles wasn’t enough and had its limitations therefore her oncologist recommended her to get a better health care plan and preferably get treated at a teaching hospital where she would have more treatment options. The odds were in her favor since she had no history of smoking and he didn’t want to waste any opportunities. We know God is in control and is looking out for my mom because a year before, he had moved my husband and I to Florida where we work in research oncology and I specifically work with lung cancer. It was obvious that my mom would have to move to Florida. In less than 2 weeks my mom packed her bags and flew over as my dad loaded a Budget truck with as much of their belongings as possible and made their way over.
Once she arrived in Florida, more tests were done including a brain MRI. The results of the MRI unfortunately showed my mom had a small brain metastasis that put her into stage 4 lung cancer. It was one blow after the other and my mom was starting to lose hope. Slowly my mom has recovered from the physical, emotional and psychological trauma and has begun her path to healing. She is currently undergoing radiation to help with the coughing that was not necessarily caused by the pneumonia but rather a tumor that was irritating one of her air passages. She had a gamma knife procedure done to treat the small brain tumor and will begin with the recently approved treatment combination of chemo+immunotherapy on the 12th of June where patients with her profile have had great success.
All of this has obviously rattled my parent’s finances. My parents were already retired and were living off their rentals in Florida. One of those homes they now have to live in and have had their income cut in half. My father is now searching for a job but at his age, it’s a challenge. He is also her primary caregiver and needs the flexibility to be there with her for her appointments. Medical bills, the cost of moving and their income cut in half has placed a financial burden on my parents and quite frankly they have enough to worry about already. My sister and I are helping out also but the cost of medical care goes beyond our ability to help them make ends meet. Any additional help would help lighten the burden my parents are carrying and would be used to help to cover her medical costs and the extra costs they have incurred during this transition.
My mother’s name in English means “hope.” She has been that hope and stronghold in our family, the one who wipes away tears and give words of encouragement during those challenging moments. She is a strong woman of God who has impacted so many people in her life. My mom is the joy of our family and what holds us all together. She has been a mentor and friend to both my sister and I. She lives for her two granddaughters who are the apple of her eye and desires more than anything else to create new memories each day with them for many more years to come. She has yet much to live for and is not ready to call it quits. She is a strong woman and I know that by the grace of God and the Hope she has in Him, she will overcome! Thank you for your help be it giving financially or holding my mom and our family in your prayers.
Staging was still not clear at the moment and she had to undergo many more tests. Unfortunately, the medical care she was receiving in Los Angeles wasn’t enough and had its limitations therefore her oncologist recommended her to get a better health care plan and preferably get treated at a teaching hospital where she would have more treatment options. The odds were in her favor since she had no history of smoking and he didn’t want to waste any opportunities. We know God is in control and is looking out for my mom because a year before, he had moved my husband and I to Florida where we work in research oncology and I specifically work with lung cancer. It was obvious that my mom would have to move to Florida. In less than 2 weeks my mom packed her bags and flew over as my dad loaded a Budget truck with as much of their belongings as possible and made their way over.
Once she arrived in Florida, more tests were done including a brain MRI. The results of the MRI unfortunately showed my mom had a small brain metastasis that put her into stage 4 lung cancer. It was one blow after the other and my mom was starting to lose hope. Slowly my mom has recovered from the physical, emotional and psychological trauma and has begun her path to healing. She is currently undergoing radiation to help with the coughing that was not necessarily caused by the pneumonia but rather a tumor that was irritating one of her air passages. She had a gamma knife procedure done to treat the small brain tumor and will begin with the recently approved treatment combination of chemo+immunotherapy on the 12th of June where patients with her profile have had great success.
All of this has obviously rattled my parent’s finances. My parents were already retired and were living off their rentals in Florida. One of those homes they now have to live in and have had their income cut in half. My father is now searching for a job but at his age, it’s a challenge. He is also her primary caregiver and needs the flexibility to be there with her for her appointments. Medical bills, the cost of moving and their income cut in half has placed a financial burden on my parents and quite frankly they have enough to worry about already. My sister and I are helping out also but the cost of medical care goes beyond our ability to help them make ends meet. Any additional help would help lighten the burden my parents are carrying and would be used to help to cover her medical costs and the extra costs they have incurred during this transition.
My mother’s name in English means “hope.” She has been that hope and stronghold in our family, the one who wipes away tears and give words of encouragement during those challenging moments. She is a strong woman of God who has impacted so many people in her life. My mom is the joy of our family and what holds us all together. She has been a mentor and friend to both my sister and I. She lives for her two granddaughters who are the apple of her eye and desires more than anything else to create new memories each day with them for many more years to come. She has yet much to live for and is not ready to call it quits. She is a strong woman and I know that by the grace of God and the Hope she has in Him, she will overcome! Thank you for your help be it giving financially or holding my mom and our family in your prayers.
Organizer and beneficiary
Carla N Daniel
Organizer
Deerfield Beach, FL
Camilo Munevar
Beneficiary
