Help strong mother Abby face rectal adenocarcinoma head on!

Abigail Viray is a 36-year old single mother based in Meycauayan, Philippines. She takes care of her ten-year old daughter alone and does some insurance work when the pain from her illness is manageable. She was diagnosed with stage 3 rectal adenocarcinoma with s/p abdominopelvic resection and tumor recurrence in 2014.

After two years of treatment, she was declared cured; this heightened the joy she felt after her daughter's father dropped the custody case against her. A short-lived but genuine joy, she remained stable for the next six months.

Mid-2017, she was told by her doctor that her cancer has recurred and metastacized. "Cancer is back with a vengeance," she told me.

Presently, her rectum sigmoid and distal descending colon are surgically absent; she has a colostomy on the lower left of her abdomen; has left DJ stent. Her diagnosis now is recurrent, stage 4 rectal carcinoma with pelvic masses and bone metastasis. Her doctor has been pushing and urging her to undergo chemotherapy, radiation, and pain treatment as soon as possible; but she hasn’t been able to due to the expenses. In the Philippines, only large-scale, extremely expensive hospitals have the technology to treat her case.

This is why I hope she gets funding for the treatments; she has been stalling treatment and it is increasingly becoming urgent for her to get treatment. The money raised will go to her medical expenses: regular checkups and treatment.

While her family has been immensely supportive, they do not have the financial capacity to help. Gail has always been the breadwinner, and now that she is unable to regularly earn money, there just isn't enough for the medical bills.

I hope to raise money as soon as possible. I don’t know her personally, but I have heard and witnessed how she strives to go from Bulacan to Manila to raise some money for her daughter and checkups.

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She did not choose her circumstances, but I’m banking on the kindness of other people – the same kindness she continues to practice on others.