03/04/2020
I just realized we had not shared this to our business pages. As most people on here know… Tonya and I are not the hundred percent open book type! Some of the time that’s just personal preference, some of the time that’s spiritual direction. This time… It’s both! And as long a post as I know this will be.... the part that makes me most uncomfortable is the part where we ask for help....it’s not about pride...it’s that open book vulnerability and being much more comfortable as a giver than a receiver! Last June, only six months after being completely finished with treatment by taking her last chemotherapy pill for the stage 3 breast cancer she had been diagnosed with in 2017, Tonya was re-diagnosed stage 4! The breast cancer had traveled to her lung. Basically three different masses… The largest being the size of a softball were on her right lung. You can’t even imagine our shock and disbelief and momentary denial! Seriously?? She had JUST gotten done taking chemo pills on December 28, 2018! How is it possible that she could be stage 4 by the end of May 2019? We even had blood work done in March which didn’t have any sign of cancer trouble! 🤷🏽♂️ So… What the heck!? I mean we were less than a month away from leaving for Israel, and how was that still going to happen? When her primary physician first told us that the cancer was back… she told him “No… We are going to Israel!… we have things to do!“ and his response was that of “Well you’re going to have to cancel Israel, because you’re going to have to get chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation again!“ We left there, rather stunned! We were unable to even conceive of such a thought that she would go through all of that hell again! The first go around… we had no idea what she was in for… we just knew she had to fight! And fight she did!! Honestly....I left there a bit pi**ed at the doctors lack of ....🤔.....everything! The same way we say at Victory… “It matters what church you go to!”… Well you better believe that it matters what cancer center and oncologist you go to! When we met with Dr Mehta, and Tonya expressed how we were supposed to go to Israel, he kind of surprised us when he said we were going to make that happen! He understands the importance of a positive attitude in the healing process, and that people fight harder to save their life when they know they have an actual life worth saving! So Tonya had two weeks in a row of chemotherapy the week before leaving. Then we went and had the life changing experience in Israel, and returned home to get back to the fight! By September it was determined that the chemo treatments were not effective enough and Dr Mehta wanted to try immunotherapy, and see if that was more effective....and it was! By December there was a 30-50% reduction in all the masses. So ...,great!👍🏾 “Keep up the good work, Honey! “ 👊🏾👊🏾
But then 3 weeks ago we found that the cancer traveled to her brain and had a large tumor around her cerebellum. So she had brain surgery 3 Monday’s ago to remove the majority of the tumor. The rest was taken care of this past Thursday with a cyber knife/gamma radiation treatment. That was pretty rough as well. Both physical therapy and occupational therapy are needed and will take all of March for recovery. What makes it tough also, is that it has meant that she could not get her immunotherapy treatment and it will be about a month and a half since her last treatment before she does get a treatment. But her attitude is positive, and has just added some major new chapters to her book! What’s tough for us is that she cannot be home alone, but I still desperately need to be working! So different ones have been coming over and spend the day with her when they can, so that I can go work, which has really been a blessing! Many people have asked what they can do to help out… and quite honestly it is our financial situation that has been devastated the most and really needs a great deal of support! The first time we went through this battle… we had a good amount of money saved prior to the diagnosis. And even then it got quickly devoured due to the enormous extra expenses as well as an extreme loss of work time!! As you can imagine, having this occur only six months after finishing treatment the first time… our finances hadn’t even gotten close to recovering!
So Deacon Sara has updated the go fund me page out of absolute necessity! She is asking that even if you’re not in a position to give… it would be a great deal of help to even share just the link with anyone and everyone that you feel would have the compassion to help. As uncomfortable as all of this is for me, I can definitely understand the concept, since we are self-employed and work completely on referrals. We have had clients in which we did very little work for them, and at a very little cost, but they referred someone else to us, who then gave us a huge contracted job! So we thank you so so much, in advance, and are already overwhelmed by the amount of love, encouragement, and just plain heartfelt giving has been shown! 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽 We are sincerely and completely humbled and grateful!!! Thank you all!!!
We have had people ask about giving in different ways other than through go fund me ... cash app, zelle, Venmo etc so here is the info for all of those as well:
Cash App- $MuchImproved
Zelle- [email protected]
Venmo- TheOwens
Last year started out like any other year for my dear friend, Tonya Ow… Sara Manning needs your support for Still Fighting! Tonya & Martin Need Your Help Now!
