Hospital News Feed
| Cancer leaves woman broke, unable to work |
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The Monterey County Herald , January 5, 2009 - Family history of disease creates fear of recurrence Cindy Garcia says she glances out the window of her Marina home several
times a day to see if her 2002 Honda Civic is still in the driveway.
The car is almost paid off, but she's four months behind on the
payments and lives in constant fear of the repo man.She's always been a person who pays her bills on time — her credit was terrific — but she's put at least $20,000 on her credit cards over the past couple of years, just to keep the lights on and food on the table. Creditors call her several times a day. And, honestly, she has even bigger things to worry about right now. Garcia, who just turned 50, is one of eight people in her family who have battled some form of cancer. Her mother and two brothers died from the disease. Her sister and her oldest brother are in remission. Two nieces are also afflicted. So in 2007, when she started vomiting up to 10 times a day for no apparent reason, she couldn't help but suspect the worst. And when her family doctor found two lumps under one of her breasts, she was horrified, but not surprised. "With all of that history in my family, I knew I was a high risk to get cancer myself," she says. "To be honest, I had been expecting it." But that hardly made it easier. Her surgery in April 2007, a double-mastectomy at Community Hospital of the Monterey Peninsula, was expected to take four to six hours, but she was on the operating table for 16. "There were complications and, to this day, I don't even know exactly what they were," she says. "I never asked. I was just thankful to be alive." Her daughter, who is 33, her youngest son, 21, her sister and three grandchildren stayed at the hospital the whole time, but her older son couldn't be there. At age 26, he's serving the second year of a six-year sentence at Salinas Valley Prison in Soledad for injuring a man in a fight. (Cindy says the other guy pulled a knife during the altercation.) "Not having (him) there for my surgery was horrible," she says. "I called the head guy at the county and told him I just needed to touch my son, and they provided me with a one-hour contact visit, but they wouldn't allow him to be there at the hospital." She spent 17 days in the hospital, then underwent four months of chemotherapy. She will have to take chemotherapy pills for the next five years, even though they make her tired and weak. "One of the worst parts for me was losing all of my hair," she says. "I knew that would happen, but I thought it would happen little by little. After the first chemo treatment, though, I ran my hand through my hair and a big glob came out, like I was pulling off a wig. I just sat down and sobbed." While her weight dropped from 165 pounds to 101, her debts piled up. Though her husband of 10 years, Junior, operates a towing service with her father-in-law, and her younger son works for a pesticide company, she's too ill and weak to return to work herself. MediCal pays for the cancer-related treatments (including an infection that left the right side of her body in chronic pain), but bills to treat a 2003 back injury have come out of her pocket. And the cost to her life in general has become overwhelming. Credit cards — lots of them — have kept the family afloat, but they're now maxed out. "I wasn't able to buy a single Christmas present for my grandchildren this year," Garcia said. She is grateful to the Salvation Army, which gave her a gift for each child, along with a turkey and some canned goods. But she says she's been told no additional help will be available from that organization until at least April. And, of course, she worries that the cancer will come back. As she says, it's in her genes. Individuals or organizations who might be interested in assisting Garcia may reach her at 262-1115. By DENNIS TAYLOR, Herald Staff Writer Dennis Taylor can be reached at 646-4344 or This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it Source: http://www.montereyherald.com/news/ci_11370801?source=rss » Post Comment
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