About Us

Let's rally around Shanna, who needs our support through her journey with this very rare Paraganglioma Cancer & unexpected medical expenses. Shanna Owens is one of the sweetest, most compassionate people I have ever known... This is her story, In 2008 I was a single Mom, just living life raising my son, having a good time. I always loved dancing all my life and through friends, I became involved in Tahitian dancing. Eventually, I became a part of the dance company which involves practicing for 3 hours every Friday night. I did this for years the friends I made and the experience I had were amazing! At some point in 2008, I remember being very tired, I was having trouble waking up in the morning, I would have a terrible headache, and no appetite. I would kind of shake it off and tell myself to get with it and get going! This went on for a number of months. Eventually, I was so tired I could barely walk to and from my car, I would take my stairs 1 at a time, when I got inside my apartment I would lean against the door and literally slide down the the ground and close my eyes and rest until I could get enough strength to get to my couch, where I would sleep for an hour until I had enough strength to make dinner for my son. I am a very positive person, so I would always say I am going to do certain things to try and make myself feel better........drink more water, eat more fruits and veggies, get more exercise. So I would do these things but I only started to feel worse I loss 10 pounds without trying, I still had no energy, really bad headaches, no appetite. So finally I made a Doctors appointment, I told my Dr. I did not feel well and all my other symptoms he wanted me to do blood work which I did and he explained that he was going out of town and his partner would get the results and give me a call but it would most likely not be necessary and he gave me vitamins to take right in front of him and he wanted me to take them every day. That was June 2008, I went to work as usual and around 4 or 5 o clock I got a call from Dr. Stanley Miller, my ddoctor's colleague whom I had never met. Dr. Miller starts to ask questions about how I am feeling, he says he has my labs in front of him and they are very alarming he asks am I bleeding from anywhere? I say no, and I actually have not had a real period for a couple of months. So after I catch him up on everything that has been going on...(remember I had never met this doctor) he tells me that my blood volume is 5.5 it should be 13, he wants me to go to the emergency room to be transfused. So, I really wanted to feel better and I was trying not to be alarmed about this doctor that I had never met, basically chasing me down and really really concerned about me. So he called me at work then he gave me his home number and asked me to call him at home, I said ok. He called me on Saturday morning before I could call him we talked for about 45 minutes and he really did not want me to do much of anything , my blood volume was so low that if I got hurt in some way I would die. So I told him that I would go to the ER on Sunday which was Fathers day 2008. So I get to the ER, he had called and spoke to the attending and told him of his concerns and why he sent me to the ER, mind you, I did everything I could to try and get out of going in to the ER, I wanted to schedule getting my transfusion. Anyway they took me right in after they took a preliminary blood work and my blood volume had gone down to 4.8 from 5.5 a week ago. So they were pretty alarmed, I am blissfully not really aware of what is really going on....I had my Mom with me, my "Sister-Cousin" LaMonica and my Mom's baby sister Wanda. We were as usual goofing off, dancing making jokes, the whole nine yards. So the nurse comes in and I tell her for the 5th time in two days that no, I am not bleeding anywhere and no I have not had a period in months. They still did an ultrasound and a rectal exam to ensure I was not bleeding from anywhere, eventually the Hospitalist that was going to be taking care of me came and introduced himself and was again going over all my symptoms and how long this had been going on and so on and so forth, you have to understand I really was not concerned I just wanted to feel better. So as Dr. Santa-Cruz (that was his name and he was gorgeous!)is explaining what is getting ready to happen with giving me whole donated blood from the blood bank (I needed 4 bags of whole blood). So, I started getting my blood in the ER, and I immediately started feeling better. So, I jokingly say to Dr. Santa-Cruz " Do you think I can get this blood and get out of here and start enjoying my Sunday?" He looked at me seriously and said "Shanna you are not going anywhere until we figure out what is going on with you" and looking back on that exchange he already suspected that I had Cancer at that time if I ever get to speak with him again I will ask him. So here we go I have my first bag of blood going, I'm feeling a lot better and they wheel me onto the Hematology/Oncology ward at Alta Bates Hospital. As this is happening I read the name of the ward and I think to myself this must be where they take people who need a lot of blood, ( they were giving me my blood over 3 days) as they can't give it to you all at once to make sure you don't have a reaction. So with my family in tow, I get comfortable in my room, blood going, hey let's get this party started! My Nurse introduces himself and tells me that I am going to have a chest CT, it was about 9:00 at this point and he said I had to drink these two huge bottles of contrast material, so I drink it, it takes me over an hour maybe two...it's finally time to go and get the chest CT. On Monday morning Dr. Santa-Cruz comes in to my room around 8 or 9 am, I was alone and I told me that he reviewed my chest CT and "it's cancer" or he might have said "you have cancer" I can't remember exactly but I remember everything started to move in slow motion and I remember looking around in the room to see who he was talking to, I was in the room alone, it had never occurred to me, that it would be anything so serious. My life flashed before my eye's, and I thought I had just received a death sentence, he told me that I had tumors in my bones, (my entire spine), my liver and some in my lungs. It was Malignant Metastatic Paraganglioma. It is extremely rare cancer, it only strikes 1 in a million of our population. That was about 6 years ago I have been fighting this disease ever since, by God's grace there was a doctor at UCSF that is a specialist in Paraganglioma and thank God he was in San Francisco! So to make a long story short I began seeing him along with my Oncologist he is amazing, the only issue is he does not take insurance. He is an amazing Doctor and I am very grateful that he is here and not across the country somewhere, but he is very expensive but worth it for his expertise, because the regular Oncologist would not know how to treat this disease because it is so rare. Please Donate @ www.ForHerCure.com