My name is Kati Moss and I am blessed to say that I am a five year cancer survivor! Shortly after turning fourteen years old I was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. After four rounds of Chemo and the grace of God I was cured. My journey taught me many valuable life lessons, and ultimately about God’s will. Sometimes it’s hard to see the good in certain situations but I now know that everything happens for a reason. Instead of questioning why things happen I now put my faith in God and trust him to take care of me. God blessed me in so many ways through my journey. He surrounded me with a loving community and the best friends and family I could ever ask for. The physical experience of cancer was horrendous; I can’t even begin to tell you all the health issues I faced. However, the spiritual experience was life changing. I’ve never felt so close to God or my family and friends. My focus was taken off of worldly things and put on my relationships. Sometimes we tend to focus more on what we don’t have instead of being grateful for what we do have. I am from Rome, Georgia. My parents are my heroes, Mike and Susan Moss, and my older sister Dani is the best friend I could ever ask for. I don’t know where I would be today without their love and support. My sickness definitely made a huge impact on our family but ultimately did nothing but made us grow closer and stronger. I am currently a freshman and an art major at UGA, I plan to major in interior design. I enjoy dancing, anything to do with design, going out with my friends, attending the Church at Northside, and spending quality time with my family! I would like to encourage everyone to live their lives to the fullest, never taking any moment for granted!

This crazy journey began on March 11, 2009. We took Brinley to the doctor due to some funny grunting noises. We were admitted to the hospital where they diagnosed her with pneumonia. After a week with no improvement, our doctor referred us to a pulminologist in Atlanta. She informed us that Brinley’s pneumonia wasn’t pneumonia at all. She said that it was a mass and that we needed to have further testing. Two CT scans, 1 MRI, a dozen or so x-rays and two surgeries later, we were diagnosed with cancer on April 20, 2009. Her last round of chemo was September 30, 2009, and she entered remission in October 2009.

In May, 2007, I went to Cairo, Ga. to visit my mother for Mother’s Day.  She fell that Friday and was in the hospital several days.  She died on Wednesday of complications from the fall and conjestive heart failure.

During that time I stayed with her  in the hospital a lot.  I didn’t feel well.  I tell you this about my mother because she had cancer 4 times and suvived them all.  I found out 2 weeks later that I had ovarian cancer.  I was glad she did not know this.

My symptoms were lower back pain and lower adboman pain. Dr. Boling ordered the CA125 blood test and a CT Scan and both were positive.  Surgery was scheduled for June.  Dr. Benigno did the surgery.  I got along real well.  I took low dosages of carboplatin and taxol for 16 weeks.  I lost my hair.  I wore wigs – they were great.

I tried to be positive through this as my mother had been through all of hers.  I had a great support group of friends and family.  I feel this is so important.  Do not try to go it alone!!

As for hobbies and interest - Harry and I snow ski, travel and are active in our church.  I have recently started a quilting class.  We have 5 grandchildren and live near them.  We are blessed.

I thank you and Relay For Life for all you do to support cancer research.

My daughter Mary Evelyn is a happy, sweet seven year old girl who also is fighting cancer for the second time. When she was two years old, she was diagnosed with stage IV neuroblastoma. Neuroblastoma is a solid tumor cancer and the leading cause of cancer related deaths among children. Most of the cases of neuroblastoma are stage IV which means the cancer has aggressively spread throughout the body. Mary Evelyn’s treatment included six rounds of chemo, major surgery to remove the tumor, two stem cell transplants (using her own stem cells), radiation and drug therapy. Through it all, many people prayed for her and God showed great mercy to her. Although she suffered a lot of pain and had many tough days, she also played a lot and developed a lot of spunk and resilience.  She always was confident that she would get better. Once she told her grandparents, “don’t worry and don’t cry because I’m going to be OK.”

Mary Evelyn was in remission just before her fourth birthday. It was wonderful news and soon she finished treatment and we started getting back to our normal lives. I donated her extra medical supplies to our vet. Our family shared our story at fund raising events for both Relay for Life and her hospital. Mary Evelyn was proud to say, “I am a cancer survivor!”. She continued to have regular scans at Egleston to be sure the cancer was still gone because neuroblastoma has a very high relapse rate.

Mary Evelyn enjoyed almost four years of remission. During that time, she completed kindergarten and started first grade. She got hearing aids to help with the damage done to her ears from the high dose chemo and started taking thyroid pills to counteract the damage done to her thyroid, but otherwise she was very healthy. Her hair grew back, blonde at first, and she grew tall. Fighting cancer as a young child gave her confidence, courage and compassion which helps her in other areas of her life. She took ballet and gymnastics and learned how to ride her bike. She lived a normal, happy life and we treasured those days because we knew how precious our time with her is.

This past December, her leg started to hurt. She was limping, which is a typical sign of a relapse. We brought her to the ER and they did an x-ray but found nothing consistent with a tumor. A few days later a urine test was done to check for a tumor marker and it was negative. The pain in her leg went away and we celebrated a happy Christmas thinking that she was fine.

In January, the leg pain returned. Once again we had an X-ray done which showed no change from the previous one. Her oncologist ordered scans to be sure.  The scan showed that she had relapsed. The cancer was back in both legs, on her spine and in her bone marrow. My husband and I were devastated. Everyone around us grieved with us, all but Mary Evelyn herself.

When we told Mary Evelyn that she had relapsed, she knew exactly how serious it was. There is no cure for relapsed neuroblastoma as she has heard us tell many audiences at fund raisers. She knew this, yet she was very calm. She processed the news and after several minutes told me,   “I spoke to that cancer and I told it cancer- I beat you once and I can beat you again in the blink of your evil eye!” Mary Evelyn has always shown a beautiful faith in God’s care for her. Countless times she has told me not to worry about her because she is going to be OK. She rests in her faith in God and has shown no grief or fear.

There is no known cure for relapsed neuroblastoma, but there is hope. Since Mary Evelyn was diagnosed the first time in 2005, incredible progress has been made in neuroblastoma research and there is hope for a cure.  It is difficult to find both funding for childhood cancer research and also to find children who live long enough to test the experimental therapies on because there are so few cases.  Even so, neuroblastoma research is one of the most promising fields right now and that gives us hope. We are trusting that God will take care of her no matter what happens, but are doing our part to save her life by trying experimental therapies. She has had two rounds of chemo and the leg pain is gone at least for now. Our plan is to go to Cincinnati for a new therapy which uses radioactive isotopes to kill the cancer cells.  After that, she will continue some kind of therapy possibly for the rest of her life. It is a big unknown for me and that is hard for a mom to deal with.

My husband and I have not had the quiet confidence that Mary Evelyn has. We have tried to set aside our worries by not allowing ourselves to think of the future. Being thankful for our daily bread and not allowing ourselves to worry about things that are not happening yet has helped, but lately we’ve come to a new level of acceptance. We are truly grateful for the blessings of each day and somehow have hope for Mary Evelyn’s future. Our little seven year old is leading the way on how to handle her own relapse by her beautiful trust in God’s mercy and His love for her. Ultimately Mary Evelyn will be fine whatever happens, but I am willing to fight hard to give her a better shot at it here in this life. She says she can beat the cancer again, so I believe she will and we are going to do whatever we can to help her win that battle.

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Stay updated with Mary Evelyn’s story at http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/maryevelynking.

My story has been a happy one. I feel like God has been good to me and has appointed my own personal guardian angel. From day one, when I was diagnosed, 12 years ago, I felt like He was taking care of me. I must say that sometimes I struggled with this, because why, then, give it to me in the first place. After all these years I’ve learned to believe that either a) He didn’t give it to me, I just got it, or b) He did give it to me because He had a reason, and I wanted to figure it out.

That night of October 20th, 1997, I was sitting in my car in front of the wheel, ready to drive off, when I remembered something and decided to go back to my office, I turned the car off, and went in again. Turned the computer on and sat in my desk for a few minutes. Next thing I know, I’m laying down, on the floor, just waking up. But when my wife asked me later that night, I didn’t remember getting ready to fall sleep, so something must be very wrong with me, she said.

That started my journey; a brain tumor was diagnosed in the right side; two neurosurgeons recommended a biopsy to find out exactly what they were dealing with. At first it was difficult, I thought I was going to die, and I had my moments of fear, like everyone else. I have always been a very religious person but never had prayed so much. But I was confused, wasn’t even sure what to pray for. I wanted to live longer, a lot longer, I wanted to be at my children’s graduation, their weddings, the birth of my grandchildren, I wanted to get healed.

But I wasn’t sure I could do that or that it was the right thing. I thought it may not be humble to pray for health, maybe God was calling me and wanted me to set an example, so I started to pray for strength to go through the illness, to be able to fight and don’t feel sorry for myself, to be able to appear like a normal person even though I was sick. I did visualize all those events in my life and I wanted to be there for my three children, and that helped me a lot, I found more strength that I thought possible I could have in me.

Also, a friend helped me realized that there were people in my life for whom I could set an example. And oddly enough, instead of getting mad at him, I found what he said reasonable, and I liked it, and I embraced it, and then I prayed even more, because that made sense; that’s exactly what option b was. But at the same time, I began developing this strange confidence that I would be healed, that I had faith God could and made me and wanted me to heal, and if you have faith the size of a mustard seed, you can move mountains, right?

Then good thing started to happen, first I went through the treatment–both chemotherapy and radiation–without almost having any bad feelings, like most people, I didn’t even lose my hair, only a little bit where the beam got into my head. Upon finishing the treatment, I started having MRIs every 3 months, and they all looked good; then every 4 months, then 6, and the last time the doctors suggested to go only once a year, something I’m not going to do, I’m too scared to let that much time to pass between MRIs.

The tumor has not forced me make big changes in my life; I work, I do sports, I volunteer in many activities, I go out, I play games, I have hobbies, in short, I’m living a normal life. And I have been neurologically perfect throughout the process, something very important because it makes surgery unnecessary for now, given that the treatment worked and that I have no symptoms whatsoever.

On top of that, the tumor is located in an area of my brain where my strong qualities, like numerical and analytical, aren’t based; instead, it may have affected those that I never had anyway, like creativity and artistic.

After 12 years, I have seen all three of my children graduate from high school and two of them graduate from college, and the youngest is graduating this semester, so with the help of God, I’ll be there in May to hug her and kiss her. By the way, I’m wrting this story the day after she turned 22. And we are all happy. I’m not going to say the tumor has been a blessing but it has made me a better person, someone who appreciates the little things I took for granted: flowers, birds, sunsets, a simple walk; and other not-so-little things we do daily or have but do not appreciate enough: the ability to see and hear, two arms and two legs, the ability to walk, run, and play; a hot shower, three meals a day, a soft bed, air conditioning and heating. And finally, the love of friends and family.