As Mary Ford explains, her story began on Sunday evening at the grocery store. She leaned into a refrigerated section at the store, sneezed, and felt intense pain in her back. A Registered Nurse, Mary was at work the next day and mentioned to her colleague that this sneeze had given her so much pain. Her colleague, a doctor, recommended that Mary get an MRI should the pain not dissipate.

Mary complied. Soon, she was diagnosed with multiple myeloma. A short time later, she and her husband traveled from Jupiter, Florida, to Houston, Texas. There, Mary underwent a stem cell transplant at MD Anderson Cancer Center. Since that time, she has had some complications, including issues with her hip that required 10 radiation treatments.

Mary, however, remains positive and upbeat. In these recordings, she shares how today she finds community at an IMF Support Group in Boca Raton, Florida. Also, she and her husband volunteer at a local hospital. Mary has reached out because as she says, “Myeloma is totally separate from all those other cancers.”