Patient Stories

In 2015, Amanda Bruffy, RN, BSN, CNRN, OCN, was about to turn 30, newly single, and had a great job as an oncology nurse navigator when she couldn’t get over a nagging abdominal pain. “My role as an oncology nurse navigator has forever been changed after being on the receiving end of a cancer diagnosis,” she says.

Jessica Morris was blindsided by her brain cancer diagnosis after hiking with friends and having a full-blown seizure. Frustrated by the lack of treatment options for and the short life expectancy associated with glioblastoma, she created the nonprofit organization OurBrainBank.

Kelly Rodenberg, author of There’s Something Going on Upstairs, offers her insights from being a caregiver to her husband Bob to dealing with her own glioblastoma diagnosis.

When she was 34 with a 6-year-old daughter, Sara Olsher was told she had breast cancer. What followed was a year and a half of treatment and connecting with her daughter in unique ways.

Nobody told Donna Avery that esophageal cancer is often fatal when diagnosed at a late stage. Now 7 years after her diagnosis, she chronicles her experience with radiation and dealing with this rare cancer, which accounts for only 1% of all new cancer diagnoses in the United States.

Sheryl Gundersen, who worked as a software sales professional for 35 years, became an expert in interpreting her customers’ body language. In this article, she describes how she used these skills in her personal journey with breast cancer while facing people wearing masks during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Amanda Rice was 37 when she was diagnosed with breast cancer for the first time. She describes her decision to freeze her eggs after her diagnosis, which led her to launch the nonprofit organization The Chick Mission to educate women on the impact of cancer treatment on becoming mothers.