Help R.S.A Fund Cancer Treatment

Hi. I'm Rhonda, also known as R.S.A. Garcia, and I'm a speculative fiction writer from Trinidad and Tobago. Not so long ago, I thought I'd someday use this platform, or another crowdfunding site, to fund a writing project. But sometimes life throws you curveballs. So here I am, asking you to help me pay for cancer treatment instead.

This past week I was diagnosed with a Grade 2 carcinoma in my right breast.

After discussions with my doctor, he recommended we not waste any time and operate right away. As in, on December 21st. The cancer is small right now, but its growing. I have an excellent prognosis, but I won't know if I need radiation or chemo until they get in there, so speed is essential.

Normally, my diagnosis would not have been a problem. I've always made it a point to have major medical healthcare insurance. However, life happens, I lost my permanent job, my mom passed and then COVID came along. 

I've been working on half a salary since April 2020 and while I thought I was covered by health insurance through my new job - yesterday I got the worst news. My forms were never submitted by HR. I have no health insurance after all.

Problem is, we're in the middle of a fourth, devasting COVID wave that's straining the parallel healthcare system for COVID and slowing the normal system to a crawl. If I go into the public system now, I might not get an operation before next year.

And my doctor thinks waiting is not an option. He also thinks I'm risking exposure to COVID if I go into the system, and if I get COVID, never mind it's a huge risk to life and limb for a cancer patient, it will also mean no one will operate on me.

But…that means finding TT$150,000 or CA$30,000 (US$25,000) to pay for three surgical procedures to be done at once (removing the lump, taking lymph node tissue for testing, and a breast reduction to try to prevent reoccurrence as I'm large breasted).

So, long story short, as my people say - I am asking you to help fund me to CA$9,000 in the first instance. With luck, I'll find other ways to pay for the rest of my expenses but if I can't, I may try to do another fund raiser.

My friend, Suzan Palumbo, has generously set this up for me as PayPal doesn't accept deposits in Trinidad and Tobago, and Go Fund Me doesn't work there either. She will collect whatever is donated and forward it to me via bank transfer. I'm hoping to get enough for a down payment by December 15th so that I have time to receive the transfer, which will take several days. But even if that doesn’t happen, it won't matter, please keep donating because I will need every little bit for my surgeries and the recovery to come after, when I won't be able to work.

I will update Suzan, and any other friend that might have to take over admin duties here, or my sister will do so as I go along.

In the meantime, if you can't donate,  you can share with friends and family you trust, but I'm not ready to have the fundraiser broadcast on Twitter or Facebook yet. Also, I'd appreciate whatever positive vibes, prayers or thoughts you are most comfortable with that I get to do this surgery as scheduled and that all goes well. That would mean a lot.
Thank you for reading all the way to the end. I'd like to leave you with a bit of joy after all this, so here's two pictures of a couple of the 13 feral cats I've been feeding since they adopted my dog's old kennel. They cost a lot, don't let me pet them, and bring me and my sister a lot of happiness. The kittens are two of our newest babies. We call the orange one Brave Boi and the white one Dot.

Talk to you again soon and thank you, thank you, thank you for donating.