This is the story of my sister in law,  who is in need of many prayers and financial assistance.

Her name is Maria das Graças Menezes, she was born on 08/29/1962, married for over 30 years and live in the capital of Brazil (Brasilia). She takes care of her husband which due to diabetes become blind and her mother in law with is 88 years old. She has a very modest lifestyle and in despite of her financial situation, she always moved mounds and engaged people for humanitarian causes. She is the type of a person that always looked for the well being of others before think how that could affect her life.

A few years back, she was weighting over 350 Lbs., with dedication and discipline, she lost half of her weight. She regains her strengths and went back to her passion in helping others. Several tragic phases in her family life, affected many people around her, but she was the anchor of the family and did not allow people to drifted away.  She is the matriarchal figure for the entire family.

In the beginning of May, she noticed a little bump on her gum, as anyone, she thought was just a little teeth problem, but it rapidly evolved into a mass and she went to the doctor, which after several exams, biopsy and MRI’s, she was diagnosed with a very aggressive type of carcinoma in the maxillary bone. After battling with the insurance company for weeks, seen herself deteriorating every time she looked at the mirror, she decided to not wait from the authorization from the insurance and perform the surgery accepting the coverage that is simply ridiculously awful. 
Her surgery will take 6 hours for the removal of the tumor, and another 8 hours for the reconstruction, and this reconstruction does not include a harvesting of the tibia bone to replace the jaw bone in her face. She decided not to do it because she cannot afford it, but if she does not do it, she will be disfigured for life. The family was able to join financial resources for the removal of the tumor and facial reconstruction, but the family cannot afford to perform the full reconstruction, which ideally should be done at the same time in order to properly reconnect the vessels and try to avoid rejection.

After this major surgery, she is going to be required to stay in the ICU for about 20 days, and after that “radio and chemo therapy” will be needed. All the possible financial resources at this point are already exhausted and this is the reason I am reaching to you to ask for some help. In the same way that is unacceptable for a baby to be diagnosed with cancer, there are people in this life that definitively don’t deserve that because all she did in her entire life was to help others. What I expect with this letter is to at least help someone that helped so many other people, which I know from the bottom of my heart did not deserve this situation in life.

Any contributions will be extremely welcomed, from a penny to a get-well card.