- [Karen] The Women Survivors Alliance is a 501(c)(3)organization
that was founded by women cancer survivors
for women cancer survivors. And we have the time of our
life celebrating survivorship, learning how to be educated, learning how to be
empowered, and learning how to give hope and share our stories with others.
Stories from the Stage was created by a board member, Joanna Montgomery.
Joanna was such an inspiration to this community and she decided one day
that she had this great idea to create a stage show. And Joanna's power and her
spirit just took over in her very first stage show. Joanna's second act ended a
couple years ago, but her legacy lives on through this stage show and we are so
honored every single time a survivor takes that stage.
♪ [music] ♪
- [Scott] So welcome everybody. I am so happy to be here tonight.
Stories of strength and perseverance you're about to hear are life changing.
It's about empowerment and sacrifice, it's about passion and belief,
it's more than about surviving. It's about focusing on making great change in your
life and then sharing that change with those who you know might need it.
- [Krista] When I laid in that hospital bed with three months to live,
I asked God why I had to endure such pain and suffering. Recovery from stage four
cancer was blessing enough, but now, I look back and see God's hand
in the midst of my deepest turmoil.
I'm Krista Anderson, and I'm a stage four kidney cancer survivor.
I absolutely love sharing my story with people. I feel like it gives them hope and
inspiration, and helps them realize that no matter what they're facing in life,
they too can overcome even when it looks the darkest.
- [D'Yuanna] I don't know that there are really words to describe what it felt like
other than utter shock. My husband and I had just undergone in vitro fertilization,
the egg harvesting part. We had been planning on starting a family in January
of 2016, and I found my lump and was diagnosed February the 5th,
and we were one week away from our egg transfer. And just like that, everything I
hoped for, dreamed for, planned for, suffered for, disappeared in three simple,
but profoundly life changing words, "You have cancer." And then one day actually,
I happened to see a video. I was on the internet searching for some sense of hope,
other women who were like me. I came across this page called Survivorville
and there were these stories of other women called My Second Act, and I
watched a couple of them and I cried, because I was sad, and I watched a couple
of them, and I cried because they were absolutely hilarious. And I knew then that
other women just like me had walked this very same journey.
- [Mary] I'm very excited about it, I can't wait to share my story.
It's only a few minutes long, but it's been my whole life. With all the
challenges I've been facing, the sun came up and the message in my heart was,
"Put your big girl panties on and let's get this show on the road."
I never looked at it when you talk about a second act, I think everybody should have
to go through this, because it just transforms us,
it makes us be the person that we really should be.
- [Jessica] Hi, I'm Jessica Meyer, and I am a brain cancer survivor.
I kicked cancer's butt about three years ago.
Being around all these women, for me, it's empowering.
Getting to see other women that have grown, and sadly they had
cancer, but they have beat it, and they're moving on with their life,
they're showing their Second Act. It's really empowering for me because I get to
connect with them. You just feel this strength, like, in the room.
I guess there's no other way to describe it.
- [Linda] You get to choose how to live your life, and there's not one moment that
I will give away to fear, or hate, or anger, except to process it and say,
"You know, I don't need this." I'm Linda Ragsdale, I'm a terrorist attack
survivor, surviving a nearly three-foot machine gun bullet wound and a stage three
breast cancer survivor, about two years now.
- Every person's story is unique. Everyone's journey's different,
everyone's cancer's different. But the emotion's the same. And that emotion is,
"What now? Where do we go from here? And what am I going to do?" And that's what
this stage show is all about. It's about...it's equally about ourselves,
as it is about the other people. But the inspiration, it's priceless.
These last five years since creating the Women Survivors Alliance has been an
incredible journey. It has been ups and downs, ins and outs, emotions,
all kinds of emotions. But to look back and to see where we were and where we are,
it makes me just excited about where we're going to go.
♪ [music] ♪