Pace Arise

Hello! We are Kevin and Michelle, 51-year-old foster parents with three kids (ages 6, 3 and 1) who we adopted. As you can imagine, life is full of crazy-hard challenges, but it's also full of lots of amazing blessings!

When Kevin was first diagnosed with stage IV colon cancer (December 2019), we had two small kids. It had metastasized to his lungs and brain. Considered a "terminal" diagnosis, we were scared, sad, and completely lost trying to find direction on what to do. The questions were never-ending and overwhelming. Should we do completely conventional treatment or should we go natural? Should we combine these two "camps"? Which way is most effective?

Our hope is to share our journey with cancer to offer support and resources that we found useful in our own cancer story. In our experience, the first step to take is to get to know what makes cancer "tick". When you know how it works, you then know what needs to be fixed so you can work on knocking it out. So we've put together a "Where Should I Start" list of cancer treatment centers and programs that we used and found really helpful in Kevin's case. This list intends to save you WEEKS of research (because that's how long it took me!). When you are dealing with stage IV cancer, the sooner you have tools in your hands, the better. We want you to have tools in your hands a lot faster than we did.

The medical professionals we went to guided us clearly and thoroughly without a lot of academic or medical jargon many of us don't understand. We discovered that help is out there, but it's not "one size fits all." Everyone's cancer is different, and there are options that can be used as a springboard for your own cancer journey.

Today, Kevin is nearly three years into that initial stage IV diagnosis. He has done a combination of surgery, chemotherapy and integrative oncology treatments. While he is still fighting cancer, it has not metastasized to additional organs in his body! He has a very good quality of life even in the ups and downs of treatment. We continue to explore more treatment options as we go and will share those with you.