Hope For Gloria and Jason

Hello,

my name is Sapphire and I am the sister of Gloria.

As most of you know Gloria was diagnosed in May of 2020 with low-grade Endometrial Stromal Neoplasm, a rare type of cancer that affects less than 1% of women.

As you can imagine Gloria and her husband Jason were devastated by this shocking news.

Gloria has since undergone multiple surgeries and treatment to destroy the cancer, for a time the treatment worked and then recent tests showed that the cancer has returned.

Gloria’s doctor is highly recommending that she have a hysterectomy in order to permanently get rid of the cancer.

While this may seem like an easy decision for some, it’s not for Gloria and Jason because they long to have a family and haven’t been able to have children yet.

They are currently in the process of egg retrieval in hopes that Gloria will stay healthy long enough to implant at least one embryo for her to carry to term before having a hysterectomy.

They plan to have a surrogate carry the remaining embryos at a later time.

As you can imagine the expense for all of this is very great, and Gloria and Jason have accrued much debt already due to her treatments, many long trips to and from her specialist in St. Louis, and egg retrieval, and many days of missed work.

I am asking that we all come together and help relieve the financial stress from Gloria and Jason, cancer is such a devastating road to journey on and the financial stress only adds more anxiety to an already overly anxious situation.

Any amount helps, no amount is too small!

Thank you in advance for your generosity, kindness and love as you give to help Gloria and Jason during this very difficult time.

I have added Gloria’s story below so that you can read a more detailed account of all that has been going on.

Blessings,

Sapphire Teague

Gloria & Jason's Story of Hope

We bereaved are not alone. We belong to the largest company in all the world

--the company of those who have known suffering.

― Helen Keller, We Bereaved

My husband Jason, whom I have been married to for 11 years, and I have always wanted a family and to be parents. We decided early in our marriage that we wanted to be well established and provide opportunities for our children that we weren't given in our childhood. Our journey has taken me from getting my GED, to graduating college, and receiving my degree in Radiology Technology. After working one year as a radiology technologist and my husband being well established in his field of video production for church ministries, we decided it was time to buy our first home and fill it with the children we had always dreamed of having. Unfortunately, our story suddenly came to an abrupt halt last May of 2020. I started having abnormal bleeding and extreme pain. This pain led to an appointment that would cause our hearts to sink to a place that we had not known the depths of before.

After a hysteroscopy with D&C, I heard the word I never thought would be used with my name. Cancer. Low-grade Endometrial Stromal Neoplasm. A rare type of cancer that affects less than 1% of women. Shock can place a person in a position of disbelief! We were finally trying for a family and this. We set out to do all that we thought best to prepare for children but nothing could prepare us for this. We were referred to a specialist, Dr. Powell in St. Louis at Barnes-Jewish Hospital, to help us along this journey of fighting and getting back on track to realizing our dream, a family.

During the toughest year of 2020, from May to December, I had three hysteroscopies with D&C and one Laparoscopy. It was decided for my treatment plan, to have me on progesterone therapy to avoid a hysterectomy at the time, to see if we could later conceive. During the appointment in March of 2021 with my specialist, the decision was made that we would try and take me off the progesterone treatment. At this point, things were really looking good for us and we were hopeful that we would be starting our family soon after my August 2021 appointment.

The beginning of Fall was also the beginning of the fall of hope. On August 3rd, 2021, I had yet another pelvic ultrasound and biopsy. They saw a small mass in my uterus during this appointment. We were hopeful it would just be scar tissue and therefore we would be able to continue with our plan of conceiving. Unfortunately, the results of the biopsy concluded that yet again the low-grade Endometrial Stromal Neoplasm was back and we needed to do another surgery to remove it. September 9th, 2021, I went under, yet again, for my fourth hysteroscopy with D&C to remove the low-grade Endometrial Stromal Neoplasm. Hope deferred makes the heart grow sick.

Our doctor suggested I undergo a hysterectomy since the progesterone treatment hadn’t worked. Inevitably, the cancer had returned soon after I stopped treatment. But, since our hearts long for children, we were given the clearance to look into fertility treatments and freezing embryos. Hope restored! The outcome, that we hope and pray for, is to be able to freeze embryos and transfer at least one to me and in the future have the remaining frozen embryos be carried by a surrogate.

The hard truth is that ultimately I will have to have a hysterectomy to keep from having this low-grade Endometrial Stromal Neoplasm from returning. We desperately need your help, as this is not something we ever imagined happening. As a young couple, we are not completely emotionally nor financially prepared for this exorbitant amount of money at one time. What makes it more critical is that we are on a very short timeline. Recommended by our specialist, we do not have the gift of time to raise the funds we need to build our family now. We would be grateful if you could afford us this opportunity to come out from underneath the consuming wave of grief to breathing the air of hope as the waves of time and health are beckoning to draw us down. Our future family will be grateful for the hope restored in realizing our dream of becoming a family.

Gratefully,

Gloria and Jason Rico