Jessica's Campaign Against Cancer

Jessica was diagnosed with breast cancer in late November of 2015. Initially, Jess’s breast cancer treatment plan included 5 months of chemotherapy followed by a lumpectomy/possible mastectomy and radiation.

She began her fight on Jan 4th 2016 with her first round of chemo treatments. Unfortunately, that plan was diverted when Jess ended up in the hospital with a life threatening reaction to that first round of chemo.  She underwent emergency surgery, which kept her in the hospital for almost 3 weeks, most of which was spent in ICU and under heavy anesthesia. During her hospital stay, she was experiencing extreme pain and discomfort in her lower back. After some tests, it was determined that she had spinal stenosis. Although unrelated to her cancer, the problem was exasperated by all her body was going through, resulting in another surgery on her back on February 3rd.

After a couple more days in the hospital, Jess headed home to continue her recovery and get stronger so she could get back to fighting the breast cancer, which started all of this in the first place. Unfortunately, on Feb 10th, Jess was re-admitted to the hospital following several days of feeling very ill. She had very low hemoglobin levels and dehydration. It was determined that she was fighting a virus -- very scary for someone in her depleted condition. After IV fluids and a blood transfusion ,Jess headed home to again try and recover and get stronger.

This all happened in the first 6 weeks of the plan, and none of it was part of the plan! As if this wasn’t enough, the family received more devastating news; On Feb 16th, Jess’s sister Tracey was also diagnosed with breast cancer. Tracey had been by Jess’s side during all of this, starting with spending the entire day at the first session of chemo to sleeping at the hospital nearly every night Jess was there. This was an unexpected and unthinkable blow for Jess and the family.

In addition to this, Manny, Jess and Juan’s 2 year-old-son broke his femur in Dec. Manny has a condition called congenital femoral deficiency. Due to this condition, the femur was not able to heal on its own and he had to undergo a right femoral osteotomy with internal fixation surgery on Feb 23rd. This surgery was planned to happen at some point in the next year to prepare his leg for future lengthening procedures, but again, the plan didn’t go quite as expected, and he had to have the surgery much earlier. (Manny is doing great! What a tough little dude!)

Obviously the original plan has changed quite a bit. Jess underwent a lumpectomy on March 9th, followed by an adjusted chemotherapy treatment with radiation still to come. Her sister Tracey had her lumpectomy on March 10th.

This family has been through so much in the last several months, and we want to rally around Jess, Juan, and Family to show them our love and support and to help with the financial burden as Jess continues her campaign against cancer!

Please join us for the Chapman-Becerra Benefit Saturday, May 21st from 1 pm - 6 pm at Drkula's 32 Bowl at 6710 Cahill Ave, Inver Grove Heights, MN 55076. For those of you not able to attend, please donate to Jessica's Campaign Against Cancer through this page!

Words can't express the family's appreciation for everyone's kindness, prayes, love, and support during this incredibly difficult time. Thank you so much!
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“Courage doesn’t always roar. Sometimes courage is the little voice at the end of the day that says I’ll try again tomorrow”
~ Mary Anne Radmacher