I am a 37 year old mom of three boys, ages 11, 6, and 3, I am a wife of a newly promoted active duty Air Force Master Sergeant, I am a daughter, friend, and a sister. I am also unfortunately a metastatic breast cancer patient. I feel very passionately about advocating for metastatic patients and am so honored to be a part of the Department of Defense (DoD) Breast Cancer Research Program (BCRP). My husband's service has taken our family all over the world. In 2012, while we were stationed in a small very remote town in Australia, I had what doctors believed to be mastitis due to nursing my newborn son. At the time, our boys were ages 7, 3, and a newborn, whose complicated delivery led to a long and difficult recovery for me. When he was three months old, I felt a hard, painful lump in my breast that the local doctor thought was mastitis, but it was not going away despite antibiotic treatments for several months. I was then given a biopsy in February 2013, and it was suspected that we might be dealing with cancer. Our amazing Air Force commander and squadron worked together with commanders back in the US to transport myself and three small children back to our country within 48 hours. My husband's commanders and colleagues were incredibly supportive from the start. They took care of everything from groceries once we landed after 25 hours of flying, making doctor's appointments, getting us somewhere to stay, and coordinating childcare. Once we were home, it was quickly revealed that I had Stage 3 triple negative breast cancer (TNBC). From the time of the initial symptoms to the correct diagnosis, the tumor had grown from a small lump to the size of a baseball.

Since there is no targeted therapy for TNBC, the standard treatments are chemotherapy and radiation. My treatments were extremely difficult for my family, but we were only able to fight through it with the support of our loved ones and extended military family. The statistics for TNBC, an aggressive subtype of breast cancer, are staggering. An estimated one in three women with TNBC will develop metastasis. To try to beat those odds, I underwent a double mastectomy, followed by major breast reconstruction and a lengthy recovery. After a year of treatments, surgeries, no hair, and recovery, I celebrated with a weekend with over 20 close friends in Vegas. We all thought we had it beat.

A few weeks later, in March 2014, I found a skin surface nodule that turned out to be a recurrence. I had surgery to remove it, underwent some preliminary scans, and prepared to start chemo all over again. Before beginning chemo again, my beloved doctor came in with a somber expression and informed me that the scans showed a mass the size of a grapefruit in my abdomen...metastasis. "I'm sorry- I know you have the kids" is all he could say. My initial reaction was instinctive and characteristic of who I am - we would let our faith guide us, and we would fight through it. We had such incredible support from our family and the military; I thought we could beat it again. While shocked, I thought that maybe I could be one of the few that survives. It was as I was saying goodbye to the staff that day, I saw my nurse turned away from me and silently sobbing. That's when it hit me: there is no cure for metastasis. A positive attitude will not change bad luck and bad cells. I am a young mother of three beautiful little boys, and there is no cure for me. I've been on chemo almost the entire time (two years) since being diagnosed with metastasis. I started a Facebook page to keep my family updated on how I'm doing when I was first diagnosed, but over the past couple of years, thousands of people have supported us by following my breast cancer journey. As a TNBC metastatic patient, I am an anomaly because I haven't had a true recurrence again. I have merely had small surface nodules that have been easily removed. I am living my life to the fullest until the next challenge comes our way.