Her Story
Everything changed in April
At a real precipice moment in her work, life interrupted the story.
In April, Elle received an incredibly rare, one in a million, Stage III appendix cancer diagnosis. It required one of the world's most extreme surgeries, involving multiple organ removals and resections: cytoreductive surgery with HIPEC.
This August, she began eight rounds of chemotherapy, intended to keep the cancer from returning. The outlook is positive. But the reality of treatment means Elle is unlikely to be able to work properly until the end of the year, and she shouldn't feel pressured to work before she is ready.
The sudden interruption places her in a potentially difficult financial position, at exactly the time her energy should be focused on getting well, not on how quickly she can return to work. It is also vital that Elle can protect her home through this period: it is where she feels safe, close to her people and to the hospital where she is being treated.
We want to help prevent that situation before it becomes one. So we are quietly reaching out to a small circle of close friends and people who care about Elle, to ask whether they might support her through the next few months, in whatever way feels comfortable.
The aim is not to make this period more dramatic than it needs to be. Quite the opposite: to give Elle a little breathing room, protect the life and work she has built, and let her concentrate fully on getting well, so that when treatment ends she can simply pick up where she left off.
