The shock and speed of a cancer diagnosis can rapidly change the course of a patient’s and their family’s life, both at home and at work. That was the case for Rebecca and her family when she was diagnosed in 2021.
In October, Rebecca started to feel really run down, just not like herself. But it wasn’t until she started to develop bruising on her legs that she knew something was wrong.
From that point things progressed at lightning speed. She went to see her PCP on a Tuesday, and by Thursday she was diagnosed with leukemia and on her way to a new hospital to start chemotherapy.
It was a life altering few days, especially for a mother of three kids under ten at the time. But the rapid diagnosis also affected things from a work perspective – there was no time to set up a plan with her job. She just went to the hospital one day and wasn’t able to come back.
Thankfully, Rebecca’s job was supportive and generously made sure her position would be held if that’s what she wanted. But as an hourly employee, she wasn’t making income, an income that the family normally used to pay their mortgage.
Rebecca received a first round of chemotherapy at Backus Hospital in Connecticut, and was able to come home around the holidays. Eventually they were able to find her a donor for a bone marrow transplant and in February 2022 she went for her month long stay at Dana Farber.
It was there when she first learned about the Joe Andruzzi Foundation. The Foundation was able to help pay that mortgage that her missing paychecks normally would’ve gone towards, as well as providing the family gift cards for groceries. It helped Rebecca ease some of the worry.
“[It’s] initially relief. When you are sick, you are feeling all of this guilt, I’m not home with my kids, I’m not contributing to household, I can’t contribute at work. That sense of being able to breath for the first time in the sense of this is one thing off my chest for a while.”
Rebecca received her transplant in early March 2022, and it’s been a long recovery. She’s been going to Dana Farber, two hours from the family’s home at first once a week, and as the numbers looked better those appointments stretched out to a new milestone of every three months.
Rebecca was finally able to return to work part time, at first minimally at 5 hours of week in August of 2022 and now up to 25 hours a week.
Through her experience, she’s seen how JAF targets what the patient really needs when going through a diagnosis, and the personal connection to Joe Andruzzi’s own diagnosis.
“They see where the need is. They realize that when a patient is going through this, there are things like your mortgage or groceries or something so specific that when you are going through it you aren’t thinking about. The things that you are struggling with. This organization is so willing and the finer points of what people need is so incredible. Knowing you have somebody who’s running a foundation that knows first-hand is kind of refreshing.”
Rebecca feels strongly about sharing her story and trying to help the next person who has to go through this.
“It’s important to speak because having cancer is so isolating because you are alone in experiencing this. By speaking up and making sure people are aware of what patients are going through and what is needed as a cancer patient. For someone who is going through it and is looking for an organization. Knowing it might feel isolating but there are people who understand.”