Support the Brossart Family

We have created this fundraiser on behalf of our friend Tamarae Brossart (Burney) and her beautiful family. Here is a little bit of her story.

Tam met the love of her life Marc and shortly after, they welcomed their beautiful baby girl Blake in July of 2018. Having a daughter was very meaningful for Tam because she knows how special the bond between a mother and daughter truly is. At a young age, Tam unexpectedly lost her mother to a brain aneurism; since then, she has lived her life knowing how special each moment is and how important it is to cherish each minute of the life you’re given.

In October 2020, Marc and Tam got engaged and were so happy. Unfortunately, the excitement was short-lived though as Tam lost her father just a few months later. Knowing how fragile life could be, Marc and Tam moved their wedding up and said “I Do” at an intimate ceremony on May 5th, 2021, her Mom’s birthday and a day that they will treasure forever. If there is one thing that everyone knows about Tam is that she can take any situation and find a way to make it beautiful and positive.

The excitement of the wedding quickly became even more joyous when they found out they were going to welcome another baby into their family. 2021 was a year of ups and downs for Tam and her family. On the one hand, things were so special, their family was growing and they recently got married, but losing her father was obviously very hard.

Despite all she faced, Tam’s positivity never faltered. After a few tough years, she knew that the year ahead would hold so much joy for their family. Their son Brooks was born on January 10th 2022, which was one of the happiest moments in Marc and Tam’s lives. Brooks was born happy and healthy, so much so that Tam was sent home the next day. At home, Blake was settling into her role as a big sister well, she loved cuddling with her little brother and loves him so much.

It seemed like things had finally fallen into place for the Brossarts; that was until things took a turn two days later when Marc was awoken to Tam having a seizure in the middle of the night.

She was immediately taken to the Brandon Regional Health Centre where she underwent imaging, and a tumor was discovered in her left frontal lobe. From there, she was referred to a neurosurgeon at the Health Science Centre in Winnipeg. Three weeks went by and her surgery date was scheduled for February 10th. At the time, Tam didn’t know much about the surgery but because of the location of her tumor, they knew surgery would be risky. This situation would be challenging for anyone to go through, but with a three-year-old and a newborn baby at home, you can imagine how hard this was for them to navigate. Unfortunately, after being dropped off at the hospital, Tam shortly found out that her surgery was being postponed with the new date unknown. This was obviously very frustrating and devastating news to hear. After being sent home from Winnipeg, the day after what should have been her surgery date, Tam suffered her second seizure.

The day finally came, and Tam went in for surgery on February 17th for an eight-hour, awake craniotomy which thankfully was a huge success. The surgeon was able to remove the whole tumor, and all of her follow up scans looked great. This news took a huge weight off of everyone’s shoulders, it felt like things were finally looking up for their family, but a phone call came in on March 9th, 2022 that quickly shattered their whole world.

On March 9th the biopsy results came back and Tam was diagnosed with an anaplastic astrocytoma (stage 3 brain cancer). Her tumor ended up being a grade three glioma with the IDH1 mutation… it is sadly incurable.

At this time, we don’t know much but what we do know is that Tam has a fight ahead of her, one she will not give up. There are treatment options such as chemotherapy and radiation that can be used to help prolong her life and help improve her quality of life as the disease progresses. Tam has started researching clinical trial options, but it is unknown at this time if that will be an option for her.

For these reasons, friends and family of Tam and Marc decided to start this gofundme. Your contributions will be used to help defray costs while Tam undergoes chemo and radiation and hopefully clinical trials in the future. Our hope is that the Brossart family can take this time to enjoy being together and make lifelong memories to cherish while they still can. There is so much still to be uncovered and decided but what we know is that Tam is not giving up, she is fighter and always will be.

Any contributions will be greatly appreciated.

Thank you so much.