How Snarky Cancer Came to Be

Well hello there you Snarky thing you!  I'm so glad you are checking us out!

I'm Trish.  And my husband Mike and I started Snarky Cancer LLC in October of 2017.  

This is the hardest part of setting up a new website I think.  I mean, talking about yourself in the 3rd person is awkward and weird.  You want to make everything sound awesome, without sounding like you are so full of yourself that your head can't fit through a door.

I could write a detailed account of our cancer story, but that would mean writing a novella.  But I will give you a quick background.  In 1992 I was a single,  pregnant 21 year old.  I also was diagnosed with my first cancer that year.  Here's a pic of me one-boobed and in labor.  Don't I look HAPPY???  

In 1993 I was diagnosed with cancer in my other breast and then my 2 year old son, Tre, was diagnosed with rhabdomyosarcoma in November 1994.  That was the worst.  Here's a pic of Tre and his cousin when he was going through chemo the first time.

Fast forward to the year 2000.  That's when I starting dating Mike and he and his son Adam moved in with us, we got married in 2002 and life was pretty damn groovy and relatively smooth for more than a decade.  Yeah, there were some cancer related surgeries for Tre and I, but that's about it. 

In January of 2014, Tre was diagnosed with cancer #2, a leiomyosarcoma. He was 21 and about 6 months from finishing his AA degree.  Mike and I brought him a present, a PS4, because if you get diagnosed with cancer, you deserve a present in my book. I made wrapping paper out of butcher paper that said, 'Cancer Sucks, but You Don't, so Here's a Present'.  I told Mike that there really should be a line of this stuff because that would make a great gift bag. So that was pretty much the first time I had the idea of Snarky Cancer. During this time we also lost Mike's mom to lung cancer.

That idea was tabled as Tre was diagnosed with cancer #3, an osteosarcoma in his jaw (yes he has a knack for growing sarcomas), just 9 months later. We named his tumor Chompy and set about to kill it. So you can see, Snark comes naturally to us! In September of 2016,  he was diagnosed with recurrence for cancer #4. Treatment and surgery sucked.   But what made it suck less was love and humor.

Tre and I have a genetic condition called Li Fraumeni Syndrome that makes us prone to cancer due to a mutation in the TP53 gene. Those of us with LFS call ourselves mutants. I have a close group of mutant friends who are the bravest and snarkiest people you will ever meet.  We talked about doing something like this.  But hell, either they were actively cancering, or our kiddos were. 

When we lost one of our group in June to metastatic breast cancer, it was the kick in my ass to bring this vision to life.  I approached Mike with the idea in July and he was just as excited as I was. 3 months later, we were Legal and on our way!

We are excited to bring our brand of Snarky Cancer humor to the world and to make cancer suck a little less. 

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