A San Diego mom who is currently battling three types of cancer is leaning on her community amid her health struggles.
KNSD, an NBC affiliate in San Diego, reported that resident Mirna Garcia has been diagnosed with Stage 3 breast cancer and also has cancer in her lymph nodes and skin. Garcia had previously been diagnosed with breast cancer in 2016 but was cleared, according to the affiliate. In November, she visited her doctor after noticing changes in her body and learned that the breast cancer had returned.
Garcia learned about her breast cancer diagnosis just days before her mother was diagnosed with Stage 4 blood cancer, KNSD reported. Her mom died in January.
“When my mom started getting sick, I actually wasn’t even worried about me,” Garcia told the affiliate in a video interview, before becoming emotional. “I put me aside and it was all about my mom. I was just worried about her.”
Garcia promised her mom before her death that she wouldn’t give up and would keep fighting.
Garcia’s community recently came together to raise money for her. According to the affiliate, dozens arrived at the Montgomery-Waller Community Park in the San Diego county of South Bay on Feb. 22 for a fundraiser to support Garcia and her family. Karina Silva, a close friend of Garcia whose 14-year-old daughter died after being diagnosed with brain stem cancer, planned the event.
Silva said in an interview with KNSD about her friend, “She’s so brave and I just want to help lift her up the way she helped me lift up when I was down.”
Attendees wore shirts with the pink breast cancer awareness symbol and a message that said, “Mirna’s strength.”
Garcia will soon undergo a mastectomy, KNSD reported. She has continued to work while going through chemotherapy for all three types of cancer.
“I’m going to fight this,” Garcia told the San Diego affiliate. “With God’s strength, how the shirts say, we’re going to get through this.”
