Kare for Karla

Beloved sister, daughter, friend and radiant soul Karla Linden needs our help.

 

On June 21, 2021, while moving, Karla took a nasty fall. She was rushed to the emergency room with a concussion and painful broken ribs. While stabilizing her the doctors discovered a large breast tumor near her heart requiring immediate and urgent attention.

 

In the wake of that terrifying discovery, she pressed on moving from her house to storage, and arranging urgent doctor and oncology appointments to discover the extent of the threat to her life.

 

During the next four months Karla saw dozens of doctors, had hundreds of images and tests, revealing a diagnosis of stage IV, Triple Negative Metastatic Breast Cancer, which has metastasized into her ribs, lungs and lymph system. 

 

Karla was scheduled to receive palliative breast mastectomy surgery. To prep for the surgery, Karla had another breast MRI on November 10, 2021 and re-broke her ribs due to weakness and deteriorated coordination as she was climbing into the machine. Subsequent to that unhappy accident a chest X-ray and CT Scan revealed an even more critical spread of her cancer, which resulted in another devastating heartbreak this past Monday November 22, 2021.

 

After witholding food for 12 hours, a challenge in her compromised condition, and losing sleep from the stress of anticipating the surgery Karla rose early that morning, traveling with her sister Nancy to the hospital.

 

Moments before she would receive more nuclear tests and an IV prior to the procedure, the surgeon entered the room and solemnly told Karla that she would NOT be getting the surgery. The doctor broke the news that Karla might not survive the surgery. Because her cancer is so advanced, the surgeon felt it was too risky even to perform the palliative mastectomy.

 

Karla's heart and career have been passionately devoted to compassionate hands-on healing. She became a massage therapist at 19, in the mid 1980s when there was no state licensure in Georgia. Following an apprenticeship, she attended the Atlanta School of Massage and became licensed in Georgia, Arizona and New Mexico. Over her long career she has worked with more than 100 touring bands and stage productions, 24 TV and movie productions (including Robocop 3 and In Plain Sight), and was Coretta Scott King's massage therapist for over four years. When Karla moved to New Mexico, she established a medical massage practice which grew to two locations with eleven staff and a prominent billboard between Santa Fe and Albuquerque.

 

The COVID-19 pandemic was catastrophic for Karla's practice and on March 28, 2020 she was forced to make the sad choice to close her practice in the best interest of the talented practitioners she employed. Karla applied for, yet never received, any government funding. She was professionally and emotionally devastated.

 

Now very sick Karla is unable to work. She has lived a humble and selfless life and her needs are modest. Her sister, Nancy, had breast cancer 6 years ago, and she has welcomed Karla and her spunky - and cute - Boston Terrier, Cher into her small, but comfortable home in Savannah, which they share with Nancy's Norman, the pug! With Nancy's support she is processing through the confounding obstacles to receive insurance coverage in Georgia, and since the surgery is not viable, is preparing for palliative/hospice care. Her appointment this coming Monday.

 

Karla has spent a lifetime putting others first, caring for them, helping with their burdens, easing their pain and loving unconditionally. She is not used to being the one to need support and might never ask for herself.

 

Guardian angels need guardian angels just as much as the rest of us do. So Karla's family and friends, the people who have been blessed by her loving and radiant spirit are asking for her.

 

Please give what you can, as much or as little, and share the campaign to help ease her pain and surround her with love and comfort during this unimaginably difficult time.

 

For those who unable to contribute, please share the campaign. It costs nothing go help spread the word ... and Karla would move mountains for all of us were the tables turned.

 

Thank you. And bless you.