It is a long and difficult story for me to write but the last few months have handed out a lot of challenges and we are ready to reach out to our wonderful and varied, deeply nourishing community for support.

This summer, the day after Mother’s Day, Leslie went in for an ultrasound on her right breast, that came out suspicious. After further testing it was confirmed cancerous, with a few lymph nodes affected nearby. Over the course of the next couple of months we went through many twists and turns as we figured out what was going on more in depth, and oftentimes the least likely circumstance ended up being what happened. We got ready for chemotherapy, went wig shopping, processed what it would be like, and things changed again. After a full body pet scan, they found she had a additional spot in her hip that also came back as cancer. This upgraded her situation to stage four metastasized breast cancer- meaning it had spread to several more places in her beautiful, vibrant body.

Those words are scary, and the word “cancer” in general is fearful. Still, amidst our fear and worry, we also had ribbons of light and trust in the great mystery!

We learned a lot about the type of cancer Leslie has. It is not treatable with conventional chemotherapy. Apparently cancer cells are killed by chemo when they are in a replicating phase, and what Leslie has is a type of cancer where microscopic cancer cells are sort of roaming around in her body, but not actively replicating at all times. So chemotherapy would kill what is in the process of forming a mass, but not these cells. This took chemotherapy off the table, and the goal became “treatment, but not cure”.

The treatment involves life long medication to control those cells.

She did get a single mastectomy, and is recovering well from that. Next month, she’ll begin radiation on her hip, and we have faith that will go well too.

We are so blessed that we are connected to so many amazing resources, and such an amazing community. She’s been seeing an integrative doctor, is on an herbal protocol, and is blessed with access to energetic and emotional healers.

You are a part of that community and the prayers, thoughts, vibes, and love really make a huge difference to us. The vision we are holding is that we believe in healing, we believe in my sister’s body, and her undercurrent of vibrancy and health. We envision the cancer cells being stopped in their tracks, and never replicating again. No need! We ask for you to hold this vision!

I am astounded by how strong and graceful Leslie is dealing with this. Her strength and grace includes being present with the wide array of feelings. She’s been able to work a little, hasn’t missed a beat being Naya’s amazing mom, and is present and generous of heart with Joab, me, all our family and friends.

Creating this fund is a way for us to let you know what is going on, ask for your support in any way it comes, and financial contributions will gratefully be received to help with medical bills, essential complimentary care, and will help create a cushion for Leslie to focus on healing without financial strain.

We really love you all and really appreciate you!

We see this as an opportunity to really focus on what is of the utmost importance in life- loving each other.