Saving Sandra: Help My Hero Fight Cancer

I would like to tell you about the most important person in my life. Her name is Sandra and she’s the most loving and generous person I know. She has dedicated herself to a life of service and to volunteer work whenever possible. She’s the kind of person who has never let the difficult circumstances of her own life stop her from finding the time and ability to care for others.

She was a single teenage parent of two in the early 90s when resources and support were in low supply. Despite many obstacles she pursued higher education at her local college and found time to volunteer as a leader in her community.

During her years at Oxnard College she volunteered at a local mental health hospital as a teacher’s aid to help adolescent children with intellectual disabilities who had been rerouted to the hospital instead of juvenile hall. She was a founding member of the MECHA club at her college and later became Vice President of student government. She would often take her young daughters to volunteer at the Humane Society of Ojai Animal Shelter and soup kitchens during the holidays. She took a course on youth crisis management at Interface Children and Family Services and volunteered her services for emergency 911 calls to assist families in crisis.

Her first job out of college was working at El Concilio Family Services with high-risk teens. There she created educational workshops, educational field trips to museums and took them to see Phantom of the Opera at the Pantages theater in LA. She has always believed in the power of education, the arts and community to combat inequality and scarcity.

 

She worked at Child Development Resources helping low income families and single parents obtain free childcare and support. She worked with disabled adults, at The Arc Foundation of Ventura County, to help them become more independent and engaged adults. Her clients registered for college, had improved health outcomes and volunteered at the local animal shelter.

She started a story time for kids in English and Spanish on Saturdays at Ventura Avenue Library. She also volunteered at the Span Thrift Store, a shop that raises money to assist homeless and low income pet owners, for a year. She has fostered through Surfcat Rescue and Adoption and when the agency couldn't afford medical treatment she adopted an elderly foster cat so she could spend the rest of her life in a loving home.


She’s been a donor for the last two years at Covenant House of California, a program for abused and neglected runaway children. Covenant House offers housing, counseling, education and guidance until youth 21 so they can live healthy independent lives.

She's the kind of woman who has spent the last 2 years (during COVID) buying food for unhoused people and driving around to deliver it on Christmas Day. She currently works as a bus driver for special needs kids and hasn't been able to return to the kids she loves in months. Some of my earliest memories of her are of going to marches for AIDS advocacy (in the early 90s) and marching for the right to have Chicano studies classes at UCSB.

The woman I’ve been describing is my mom and she has cancer. We got the news over the holidays that it’s rectal cancer. And I have to be honest, I’m scared. My mom has always been a guiding light and force in my life. She is the reason I went to college and the reason my sister and I pursued careers of service helping others. When things aren’t going well I have always been able to steady myself with her strength and love. And my sister and I now face the possibility that she may not be here.

My mom is a fighter and we're taking this one day at a time, but we need help. I have never made a GoFundMe but without community support, the next few months are going to be really hard.

So I’m ask our community, please help a woman who’s dedicated her life to others. Time and time again she’s shown up for her community and I hope our community can show up for her because she needs all of us. Thank you.

 

With gratitude,

Monique Diaz and Cassandra Mishenko

And if you want to use Venmo: @modiaz28