Love, Mary Ellen

— UPDATE AS OF 7.7.19–

With heavy hearts, we have to tell you that that our beloved mother and wife, Mary Ellen Donohue-Polin, passed away at 4:20 PM on Saturday, July 6th.   

Although we are greatly saddened by our monumental loss, we are happy to say that Mary Ellen passed peacefully and gracefully with a smile on her face.  She spent the last few weeks surrounded by family and friends, making all of her own decisions until the end.  

In lieu of flowers, we would greatly appreciate donations to this GoFundMe account.  Thank you for your support during this tough time for our family — and above all, thank you for loving Mary Ellen as much as we did. We'll provide information about her memorial soon.

Thank you for your love,
The Donohue-Polin & D’Arena Family

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--UPDATE as of 7.3.19 --

Mary Ellen is so touched by all of the beautiful notes and is very grateful for the donations. She wants to thank every one of you for your generosity, which brings her immense relief, knowing many of the medical bills and such will be covered. With your donations we have been able to hire a night nurse to care for Mary Ellen in the evenings. This has been a tremendous help for our family!

She is surrounded by close family in her home and we want you to know she is comfortable, brave and strong. We are eternally grateful for all of your sentiments and donations. Please, if you know anyone who would like to be updated kindly share this campaign. 

We love and appreciate everyone of you, 
The Donohue-Polin & D'Arena Family

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We’re writing this on behalf of our dear mother, Mary Ellen Donohue-Polin. As most of you know, back in 2014, Mary Ellen was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. For five years, under the guidance of her brilliant doctors, she has fought bravely to beat back the disease. Her doctors were optimistic. But then in February of this year, the cancer reappeared and began spreading aggressively. Even so, Mary Ellen has never wavered in her devotion to her family and her non-profit work throughout this difficult, difficult time.

This is not her first battle for her life. More than three decades ago, Mary Ellen gave up her years long struggle with drug addiction — finally putting down the dope and devoting her new life to helping others as an active member of Narcotics Anonymous.   

Mary Ellen's love for NA is immeasurable. She has touched countless addicts through sponsorship, friendship, and service to the NA fellowship. She has regarded helping addicts in recovery as vital to her own recovery, and it’s brought her true joy and fulfillment. Relationships she’s had with her sponsors and sponsees, some of them for decades, blossomed into what she calls her NA family.

And of course, there’s her blood family. Mary Ellen has three beautiful daughters, a granddaughter, and a grandson. As many of you know, twelve years ago this family lost Mary Ellen's husband and the girls’ father, the wonderful and brilliant Mike Polin, also to cancer. Mary Ellen and her daughters walked down that rocky road together, too, hand in hand every step of the way.  

Miraculously, out of that devastation came love, when Mary Ellen met Al D'Arena. Al’s unwavering love for Mary Ellen has been a huge source of strength for her. They married last year, and they’ve been sharing a beautiful life in Old Lyme, Connecticut.  

Al and Mary Ellen, her family, and the doctors have explored every possible treatment for her cancer. But now they’ve made peace with their new reality: the battle has come to an end. For all of us, our new goal is to make sure Mary Ellen has a comfortable life in the remaining time she shares with us. We will not let cancer dictate how she spends her final days.

We know Mary Ellen comes from a large and loving community, and we now turn to this community for support. We’re asking for your help. Your donation will help her family with paying medical bills and putting together the memorial service that will honor this woman we all love so much.

From the bottom of our hearts, the Donohue-Polin & D'Arena family thanks you for your continuing love and support. We thank you in advance for helping our family honor our heroine, Mary Ellen Donohue-Polin.

For anyone INTERNATIONAL who may want to also donate, please do so by PayPal to [email redacted]