Join Stephanie's Journey to Beat Breast Cancer

Hi, my name is Stephanie, Seth to many of my friends. This year started off on a high, ready to start new life practices and face my health journey once and for all. Many of you know I'm quite the anxious type, worried about what healthcare professionals would uncover, thus letting health scares fall by the wayside. This year I told myself that I would not allow my anxiousness to follow me into the new year.

So I went to the doctor.. and then to the ER.. where they discovered the tumor in my breast. This ultimately led me to the care and treatment of Westchester Medical Center. The doctors there acted fast and immediately got me into testing and ultimately scheduled for a biopsy. The wait was awful, as you could imagine.

I was eventually diagnosed with Triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), a subtype of invasive breast cancer. TNBC is a type of breast cancer where the cancer cells lack estrogen and progesterone receptors, and they don't overproduce the HER2 protein and often requires Chemotherapy, which my doctor informed me would be looking like 3-6 months of treatment. After Chemo I will likely be facing radiation and multiple CT Scans, MRI's and any tests and monitoring necessary which costs thousands of dollars each. My recent mammogram was $2,076 and an Ultra Sound of $3,467. I'm still awaiting medical bills from my Biopsy and recent Port installation, on top of any other billing required for these procedures.

As I said, I have just recently had surgery to insert my Chemotherapy Port. A chemo port, also known as a port-a-cath or implanted port, is a small, implantable device that provides easy access to a major vein for the administration of chemotherapy drugs, blood transfusions, and other intravenous medications.

As you can probably assume- due to my tumors rapid growth, I have had to take medical leave from my place employment in order to arrange appointments, surgeries, etc. and am hoping to have Chemotherapy sessions begin immediately.

I remain to stay my positive self even despite this terrible news, and, with the help of my partner, friends, family, and colleagues, I am hopeful to make it out of this on top and finish 2025 on an even more positive note than I had intended.

If you can't donate, that's okay! A simple check-in is sometimes all you need in these times of uncertainty. Thank you for taking the time to read about my journey, that in itself means the world to me. All I can ask is that you share this post with others and help me get this ball rolling in my road to recovery.

Love you all. Thank you!