Helena is charged with energy, that could be enough for several people. At least for two.
But last summer when she came back to work after a two-week illness, she suddenly felt she has no powers and no energy at all. She took a test and found out that she has blood cancer, acute leukemia.
It was the first summer she couldn’t take care of her village garden in Orlovskaya region. She didn’t see roses and clematises she planted in the spring. She didn’t embroid those same flowers in the evening when it was too dark to work in the garden.
And it was not the only she thing she couldn’t take care of anymore. In the middle 2000s her husband broke his spine, and he couldn’t walk. So, Helena had to take care of everything by herself. She worked at two jobs; she took care of two children — she carried a load that was hard enough for two persons. And in the evening, she always had something nice to say to her loved ones. And her family grown through time. In 2011 her third daughter was born.
She managed to get her husband back on his feet, but as it turned out it was not the end of their hard times. Very soon it was time for the family to worry about Helena.
Right after she heard the diagnosis, she had to leave her family and go to Moscow. The first course of chemo ended up with multiple side effect: extremely high temperature and horrible burns on her skin, which took months to recover from. It was obvious that standard chemo doesn’t work, and she needs some other treatment. The new course of therapy includes a bone marrow transplant, but some procedures aren’t free and Helena couldn’t pay for the search of a donor.
This summer Helena is not going to take care of her garden. She’s not going to spend evenings with her loved ones. All she has for now is embroidering and receiving medical treatment.
But it all can come back next year. All she needs is to get better. And we could help her get there.
