Kathleen Kicking Cancer
Your love, prayers, positive thoughts, well wishes, and help are much needed for our dear friend and her son in this very challenging time in their life.
One of my closest and most generous friends, Kathleen is going through a second bout of breast cancer that required surgery in May. She's currently undergoing chemotherapy and will start radiation this fall. While these traditional therapies will keep the cancer under control they unfortunately will not prevent the cancer from coming back.
Her particular type of breast cancer is a tough one. Triple negative cancer currently does not have a targeted treatment. Kathleen’s working really hard to do all she can because another recurrence won't bode well for her prognosis, nor for her family. This involves working with a Naturopathic Oncologist that will supplement chemotherapy and radiation treatments. She's very lucky that this specialized oncologist is close by here in Bend as there are very few nationally. Dr. Neubauer is the granddaughter of Dr. Sidney Farber, who pioneered chemotherapy. While the doctor is in network, the vast majority of what she prescribes is not covered by insurance. Insurance will partially cover certain kinds of massage, Reiki, and acupuncture, but not all of the supplemental treatments. Complicating Kathleen's experience and pain, is her neck in which she has bone spurs and two vertebrae that are bone on bone. The Ortho team is talking cortisone now and surgery in the near future.
Kathleen's primary concern is always for her 10 year old son. She wants to be sure she can keep him active, happy, growing and engaged. They had hoped to travel this summer, but alas that's not possible so they are scrambling for last minute camps in August and sports lessons this fall. Tennis or Martial Arts connections welcome.
For the month of July, Quintijn will be with out of town family and friends, and Kathleen will be relishing a bit of time to herself. Though enjoying the quiet time, it will be tainted by the effects of chemotherapy that zaps her energy in so many ways. With only Kathleen in the house and not knowing what foods are appealing, we anticipate she will just periodically order groceries and Door Dash. Additionally, she will need to employ house cleaners and yard people as these types of ordinary tasks become too much very quickly.
Kathleen runs an Etsy shop as a way to generate revenue: https://www.etsy.com/shop/TulipNoir. But as you can imagine, it is inconsistent and won't cover everything. Any funds you can contribute to sustain Kathleen and her son until she gets back to work, would be deeply valued.