Elly Mayday died on March 1.  “Ashley was a country girl at heart who had a passion for life that was undeniable. She dreamed of making an impact on people’s lives. She achieved this through the creation of Elly Mayday which allowed her to connect with all of you. Her constant support and love from her followers held a special place in her heart,” posted her family on social media. Chatelaine had the opportunity to speak with Mayday in June, 2017.  Elly Mayday grew up on a farm in Aylesbury, Sask., (population 50) baking pies with her mom and dreaming of international adventure. Wh ..read more

The Pettersen girls: Kate, Lee, and Ali. Photo, John Knox. Eight years ago, my mom, Lee Pettersen, was diagnosed with stage-four ovarian cancer. She’d gone in for a routine checkup and her doctor found a tumour the size of a DVD. My dad, her husband, had died less than a year earlier of a sudden heart attack. At 61 years old, newly widowed, my mom was told to get her affairs in order. I was in Kingston, Ont., in my final year at Queen’s University. I remember my mom calling me and saying, “They found a tumour. It’s going to be OK, but I need to have surgery, so you need to come ho ..read more

Laura Amanda Kelly and her mom, Brenda, in 2011. I never expected to find myself awake at 6 a.m., hands turned orange from scrubbing 50 pounds of carrots, juicing every vegetable in sight and making coffee enemas to deliver to my mother — all in a last-ditch effort to save her from cancer. But there I was.  Cancer has been a constant presence in my life. My dad died of brain cancer when I was two years old. The same disease took my grandmother. My grandfather died of breast and bone cancer, and I lost one aunt to ovarian cancer (a disease another aunt has fought and survived, along wit ..read more

Elana Waldman During her time with us, Elana invited our readers inside her life, sharing her struggles with chemotherapy, her worry over how her young daughter was coping with her illness and the joy she felt spending every spare second she could with her family. On June 4, 2013, Elana’s journey ended. More than 1,500 people attended her memorial. Here, her friend Leigh Himel offers a heartfelt farewell: The first time I saw Elana was in a video her husband, Mark (a high school friend of mine), posted on Facebook. Elana was speaking to an audience about getting married, giving birth to a b ..read more

In August 2010, Elana Waldman introduced herself to the Chatelaine audience. She told us how five years ago she’d been diagnosed with ovarian cancer and that at 37, she had beaten the 30 percent survival-rate she was initially given. Over the next three years, she was brave enough to share with us her multiple battles with chemotherapy, her fears and concerns for her young daughter Sydney — and more importantly — the happiness she felt come holidays and celebrations. In late May 2013, Elana’s friends at It’s Time To Shout (the site she created to give those with ovarian cancer a voi ..read more

I know it’s been a couple of weeks since I posted, but there’s been a lot going on. As it turns out I don’t qualify for the clinical trial that I last wrote about. Here’s the email that I sent to my family and very close friends. Please read it, and then I’ll bring you up to speed on what has happened since: Hello all, Well, there has been a change in the plan. I apologize in advance, this is not good news. Take a breath, take a chair and then keep reading. No clinical trial for me. As you know they did a whole series of tests to get baselines before they started the trial. Unfortunately, the ..read more

Photo by Getty Images Wow! Who knew a person could have that many medical tests in one day. Last Friday I went for the screening tests for the clinical trial I am going to start. My day started with some blood work and some questions from my nurse. No problem! I then had an ECG to make sure that everything was fine with my heart. Once my blood test results were back I met with one of the doctors on the clinical trial team (really nice guy – wish I could remember his name). He gave me some neurological tests. Happy to say that I was able to recall the words he told me to remember and I was a ..read more

Sport an ovarian cancer ribbon to show your support As both a wife and mother, our blogger Elana Waldman shares the triumphs and struggles of battling ovarian cancer for more than seven years. As promised, I am writing to let you know what happened after I met with the phase 1 clinical trial team. First, I need to say that I hated the doctor I met with. He opened the meeting by saying, “So you’ve been referred to us because your doctor has run out of options and he wants to see if there is anything left that we can try.” OY! Talk about setting the mood. And after I’d left my doctor’s offi ..read more

Photo by Getty Images So it’s been a while since I have had an update on treatment because I have been doing the weekly Taxol since August. But, all good things must come to an end. My numbers hit a plateau a few weeks ago and then started to rise. The Taxol was no longer working. I had a CT scan a couple of weeks ago and it showed some small growth in some of my tumours. Needless to say this news was not well received. I was really hoping to get a year out of the Taxol and to last through this summer. This treatment failure also hit me particularly hard because I had always thought of week ..read more

Photo by Masterfile As I lie here awake at 4 a.m. I ponder the big life questions. Have I made a difference? Have I left my mark? Did I accomplish anything truly great? I think we all ask these questions at some point or another. I don’t think I am unique that I wonder about the meaning of it all. I think that having cancer may just make the search for the answers to these questions a little more urgent. I don’t know that I will find the answers to these questions. In fact, I don’t know if they can be found. So, what is the point? What are we here for and how do we know if we have accomplis ..read more