Help Brit and Vera with Iggy’s Last Year

My name is Brit Peterson. I have had the honor and privilege of spending the last 10 years loving Iggy, whom many of you know as Gary. He introduced himself to me that way when we were paired to stand up at my cousin’s wedding. When I discovered his name was actually Igor, I thought, “Nope, you’re not a Gary. You’re an Iggy.” My Iggy. We had so much fun walking down the aisle together that day we did it again the next year.

It is with a heavy heart that I have to inform you all we won’t have a 10th wedding anniversary next year. I am losing the love of my life, and Vera is losing her Papa. I apologize for some of you finding out this way. It is challenging enough to tell people you see every day that your husband is dying. You would think the more people you tell the easier it gets. It’s harder. It solidifies it in reality. I am here writing this so everyone knows our story now. But also because we are in desperate need to make sure we get through his last summer without income.

Iggy’s Cancer Diagnosis

It started in November 2022, right after Thanksgiving. Out of nowhere, Iggy started throwing up violently. I remember being annoyed that he had the flu because my mom was visiting in two days. My dad had recently died, and she was making plans to move here to be closer to us. He insisted, however, that he knew what the flu felt like, and this wasn’t the flu. So we took him to the hospital. They performed a CT scan, and they found a mass blocking his colon.

Iggy’s father had been diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer earlier in the year. I remember telling Iggy to get a colonoscopy. His doctor said he did not need one until he was 45. I bugged him more about doing the dishes that week than getting it done anyway.

Five days after the mass was discovered, a stent was placed, and the biopsy results came back one day before Vera’s 6th birthday. Like his dad, Iggy was also diagnosed with Stage 4 colon cancer on November 30, 2022.

I had called his mom to tell her that her son has the same cancer as her husband. What are the chances? Your mind races to make sense of it. It does not run in the family. Even if it did, I would expect it to rear its ugly head in 30 years, but not for them both to get it at the same time, 30 years in age apart. It felt like a catalyst triggered it, and then I remembered where they were on April 26, 1986 when a power plant exploded within an hour of where they lived.

Iggy was Vera’s age at the time. They were the same distance away as Hood River is to Portland. The Jewish Federation Fund assisted in getting his family out of the USSR when he was 9. Sadly a few years too late. This event could explain why Iggy has such an aggressive genetic mutation of cancer cells. The mutation is called BRAF. The prognosis is poor.

Iggy’s Treatment Journey

Iggy started chemotherapy on Christmas. He handled the first few rounds of chemo like a champ. However, the weight loss has been too rapid. He has gone from 185 lbs to 120 lbs in just 3 months. His system is shutting down. We kept our eyes on the prize and pushed. By the beginning of March, he was just a shell of his former self. He slept all day, and had to stop working. I waited a week for disability forms to arrive from his work before calling. Last Wednesday, I found out that not only does he not have disability through work, but in the cloud of chemo, he forgot to turn in his FMLA form and ran out of PTO. In addition to no longer having income (SSDI won’t start paying for several months), it is likely he has lost his job and his health insurance through work.

Friday we went in for our first scan results since his diagnosis. Chemo did not work. We have hit a wall. And it seems there is nothing we can do but fill out forms and cross our fingers for financial assistance as he goes into Targeted Therapy.

Our Need

Initially, I had considered a GoFundMe because I worry about financially supporting Vera alone. Aside from the loss of her father, what more will she watch other kids have while we struggle to make ends meet. I also wanted to go on one last vacation and get Igor air conditioning so his last summer would be comfortable. But now I realize the need is far more immediate. I have to go to work now while I am also desperately trying to make family memories. Will Vera feel like she is losing both parents? Will I miss the last few months of Iggy’s life? In the four months since Iggy’s diagnosis, I never dreamt I would have to abandon him or our child to keep us afloat. It is absolutely devastating to all of us. These funds could buy us some time so that I could find a position where I could at least work from home. We are a close family. And we need each other more than ever.

The best way I can describe how I feel right now is that I am claustrophobic and trapped in a sand timer. It’s shatter proof glass. I see everyone walking by with pity eyes and there is nothing that anyone can do to help me. Some days I wake up on the top half. And I am simply falling. And I am fighting. Other days, I wake up in the bottom half. And I am just drowning. And I can feel my lungs filling with sand. It takes everything I have to not crumple to the floor with this invisible weight. I think about all the things that Iggy and Vera are not going to have together. Iggy is not just my best friend he is hers too. Will he see her ride her bike without training wheels? He won’t bring flowers to her recitals. He won’t put Band-Aids on her knees anymore. He can only ever dream about what she will look like when she grows up. He will never know who her first crush is. Or be there when she gets into a fight with her BFF. Will she go to college? What will she be when she grows up? Will she have a family? Will she be afraid to have a family? The more I keep trying to find fun things to do together to make memories I just find things we have now done for the last time.

Will You Help Us?

Thank you for getting this far. Thank you for reading our story. Thank you for choosing to help us continue to make memories for whatever time we have left as a family. I will update this page with information periodically so that you know how Targeted Therapy goes. And what new things we find to do together. Know that we are seeing your messages and notes even if we have not been able to respond to each one yet.

P.S. If you have been putting off any of your own medical testing, please take a moment and get it done.

P.P.S. No one else is raising funds for us, so this is the only official fund raiser. Thank you.