Cheryl Mills' Healing Journey

My name is Jamin Mills.

Many of you know my mother, Cheryl Mills, who is a loving wife to my father, David Mills, and a wonderful mother to me and my brothers, as well as a sweet friend to many people across the U.S.

Recently, my mom has been having health complications due to a large tumor that has been growing in her abdomen. When a doctor first tells you news such as this, the first reaction is hope that it will go away and that life can continue as normal like it has for years. No one expects their body to break down and refuse to heal itself. However, in my mom's case, the tumor continued to grow, sometimes slowly and sometimes at a much quicker rate. Stress only added to the speed that the tumor grew until eventually the pain and discomfort as well as the inability to eat or rest became great enough that my mom decided to talk to the doctors about having it removed.

This was a big step for both my parents, as they have lived their lives as close to nature as possible, growing their own food for most of their lives and even running an organic farm for some time. Daily exercise has always been high on the list. Their reasoning was that if you take care of your bodies, then medical intervention need only be minimal. And so my mom continued that way until she could do little more than crawl painfully around her home.

Despite my parents' concern about the complications of medical intervention, and despite their inadequate medical insurance coverage, the increasing pain and immobility of my mom drove her to schedule surgery to have the tumor removed. Post-diagnosis revealed that the tumor had no cancer markers, which is a huge relief; however, the surgical procedure was extremely invasive and recovery will be challenging and demanding. It's a battle that my mom is willing to fight so that she can continue to be there for her family and friends. To date, she was just recently released to go back home, and already some of the strain and stress of having a growing tumor is lessened even though she is in a significant amount of pain.

I ask for help because the battle my parents won't be able to easily win is the current medical costs. Both my parents are retired, and while my dad occasionally works here and there to cover daily necessities, their medical insurance was not able to cover the costs and my parents' budget cannot make up the shortfall.

Thank you

Jamin