The Reservoir: A Community Approach to Cancer

Marie Ketelie Seide

THE WELL OF PBC / DEC ISSUE 2021

10

It was evident I only had one choice: Fight. I would fight for myself, my family, and later my community. Unfortunately, my mother passed. I was overtaken by sorrow and knew my fight wasn’t over. After undergoing treatment and reconstruction, I focused on aiding my surrounding community and founded the Marie Louise Cancer Foundation (MLCF).

Can you imagine? I was a single mother to a teenage daughter and now my mother was perishing slowly before my eyes while I, too, was fighting for survival. I knew I wasn’t willing to be defeated by this monster. I couldn’t allow my loved ones to bear the burden of losing two maternal figures within months of each other.

With a family history of cancer, I never thought I’d be directly impacted by cancer not once but twice within weeks. In October of 2005, my sole surviving parent, my mother, was diagnosed with Stage IV cancer. Amid providing support financially and emotionally to my mother, I was dealt with another blow to my core. Two months later, I received my diagnosis of Stage II breast cancer.

BY MARIE KETELIE SEIDE,RN | MLCANCERFOUNDATION.ORG

A Community Approach to Cancer

THE RESERVOIR

THE WELL OF PBC / DEC ISSUE 2021 11

The Reservoir is the cultural space for contributors to highlight customs, celebrations, holidays, rituals, recipes, and more. To contribute, send your article ideas to thewell@bewellpbc.org with “The Reservoir” in the subject line.

I know anything is possible with a fighting spirit. As the saying goes, “God gives the hardest battles to the strongest soldiers.” With a bit of faith and a solid support system, we all can achieve remarkable things, and that includes a second chance at life. If you need information, please visit our website: mlcancerfoundation.org. Thank you.

Through teamwork, we are committed to ensuring every woman who seeks our help is prepared and equipped with the necessary tools and resources to fight cancer. Once we tap into that deep, unknown hidden strength, we can overcome any obstacle.

Our foundation provides the Haitian community with the resources and tools needed to battle and defeat the enemy of cancer with experience and compassion. We strive to create a family-oriented atmosphere to ensure women feel safe and at home. In conjunction with providing moral and emotional support, we also aid with transportation, Creole-to-English translation, treatment, food, and housing if funding permits.

” The norm for our culture, rooted in extreme poverty and hardship, is to work together and develop personal relationships

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All the women we’ve encountered are incredibly courageous, whether they are aware of their bravery or not. They all want to fight for their right to live.

Through MLCF, we provide an outlet to strong and brave Haitian women diagnosed with cancer, the majority of which are first-generation Americans with zero-to-little support (financially and emotionally) from their families. Their barriers to treatment are overwhelming. The only thing they have for sure is a disease that is killing them.

We are in the heart of Boynton Beach, which has a growing Haitian population. I identify as a Haitian woman who survived breast cancer. I know the norm for our culture, rooted in extreme poverty and hardship, is to work together and develop personal relationships.

THE RESERVOIR