Since 2016, GreatNews.Life’s Survivor Series has spotlighted cancer survivors who are in remission. These survivors share their inspiring stories of hope and impart wisdom and resources to those battling cancer and their loved ones.
Juanita Segura was born and raised right here in the Region, and she still resides in her hometown of East Chicago, Indiana. She’ll observe her cancerversary this November, as it’s been almost exactly 10 years since she was diagnosed with lung...
Laura Herrod resides in Chesterton today, yet she grew up on the South Side of Chicago. She is a middle school counselor working in the Region. Twice she has battled cancer and survived it. Her stories now serve as testaments of endurance to women...
Sue Straatman sat in a doctor’s office in the Community Healthcare System (now Powers Health) Hospital Emergency Room next to her only son, Rob, when she received her ovarian cancer diagnosis in 2008. The team of five doctors sitting in front of...
Colleen McQuillan, a resident of Highland, has religiously received mammograms since she turned 40. When she couldn’t secure an appointment at her doctor’s office in Illinois in 2020 for a mammogram, she made an appointment in Indiana instead....
John Dempsey, a resident of Munster, Indiana, began his long battle with cancer at the age of 52-years-old. Dempsey had no idea that receiving a colonoscopy as a preventative measure would begin a six-year journey with colorectal cancer. Dempsey...
Portage resident David Fadely has been coaching Pop Warner football in Portage for 14 years, and he has even led the Portage team to its first national tournament appearance. In 2019 Fadely was starting to feel sick which he attributed to the stress...
For Ty Artherhults, the first signs of cancer came in the fall of 2021. Artherhults was experiencing bowel problems and other significant symptoms, which led him to see Dr. Hector Marchand, Jr. in Valparaiso. Around Christmas, Marchand ran tests on...
Gary resident LaKenya Mackey-Ellis beat breast cancer not once, but twice. It would start when Mackey-Ellis went for a routine mammogram where she found out she had breast cancer. She was diagnosed for the first time on June 17, 2017. “I was pretty...
Crown Point resident Shelly Barnes’ battle with cancer started in January 2014 after her girlfriend passed away from breast cancer. Barnes had grandkids who she did not want to leave, so she had her daughter-in-law find her a place for a mammogram....
For Valparaiso resident Cheryl Highlan, it started in July of 2022 with a routine mammogram. The doctors found a lump that, when the biopsy results came back, revealed that Highlan had breast cancer. Highlan’s care team at Northwest Health - Porter...
