Sandy Rice's Cancer Fight

After watching our mother, Sandy, fight cancer for three years, we thought the hardest part was behind us. Little did we know, it was only the beggining. 

Rewind to the beginning...

In the beginning of 2013, our mother was diagnosed with advanced lung cancer. The doctors wasted no time in starting treatment. After removing most of her lung, Sandy went through several rounds of chemo therapy, along with radiation. We watched for the next couple of years as scan after scan came back without giving us the results we had hoped for. While it would have been easy to give up, our mother has always been a fighter and she took on every treatment like a champ. 

Through all of her treatments, chemo and radiation sickness, she continued to take care of her family. The same year our mom was diagnosed, our parents moved our grandparents from Pennsylvania to Oklahoma to live with them. That way, they could take care of and help support our grandparents as it was getting more and more difficult for them to take care of themselves. Being the owner/operator of Rice Trucking has had its perks, however it made all of this very difficult for our father, Bob, who drives to provide for his family. This meant he had to be out on the road for weeks at a time in order to pay the bills, instead of being home to help care for our mother and grandparents.

Although it was hard, Sandy became a beacon of strength, especially in the eyes of her grandchildren. She never missed a  family holiday, or a birthday party and always offered to watch them whenever we needed support. 

Cancer wasn't going to bring her down! 

In 2015, after dealing with a bad case of pneumonia due to her compromised immune system, we were scared the cancer was getting more aggressive. The doctors wanted to try another round of chemotherapy and after a lot of convincing, Mom agreed to try it one last time. Miraculously, it worked and she went into remission. 

Fast forward to July 2016

On July 22, 2016 our sister, Sherrea, celebrated her 10 year anniversary with a vowel renewal in Florida. Our whole family was there. Mom decided this was the one occasion she didn't want to feel sick or swollen, so she decided not to take the steroids she had been on since her last chemo treatment a year ago. This would end up being her saving grace.  

On Friday, July 29th, Sandy started getting headaches and began feeling dizzy. After going to lay down she was found unresponsive when our father went to check on her. Once she arrived by ambulance to the ER, she received a CT scan which found two spots on her brain that were causing her symptoms. After seeing her oncologist, we learned that the steroids were masking the symptoms of the tumors by keeping the surrounding brain swelling down, and that if Mom hadn't stopped taking her medicine, she only would have survived a few more months. 

The tumors in her cebreal cortex are 2cm and 1cm in diameter and have started to affect her speech and motor skills, but we still have hope that continued treatment will help. There are only two of them, which means the cancer hasn't spread very far. The doctors have started Stereotactic Radiation Therapy, which can deliver precise treatment in high doses, while helping to preserve the healthy surrounding tissue.  She will go through treatment every day for two weeks in order to determine how the tumors respond. We're hopeful the radiation will work and that it will prevent additional tumors from developing.

What now?

This diagnosis has been very sobering for our family. We are all doing the best we can to help support each other and our parents, but there is only so much we can do. We are asking for your help to cover the additional medical costs our parents are now facing, along with the bills and food expenses. Your donation will give our father the ability to stay home to spend time with and care for our mother, instead of having to be out on the road to make sure the bills get paid. 

We thank you from the bottom of our hearts and appreciate your positive thoughts, support, and donations more than you could imagine. Every little bit counts. 

With gratitude, 

Sandy's Children
(Lucinda Williams, Sherrea (Jack) Taylor, Dustin (Erika) Rice, Bobby Rice, Jonathan (Tosha) Rice)