Belle Chatelain was 60 when she heard the words no one is prepared for. What followed was a grueling stretch of treatment: three rounds of chemo over nine weeks, surgery to remove part of her right lung and 18 lymph nodes, then radiation five days a week for six more weeks. Throughout her treatment, Belle leaned on the support of those around her. Herhusband, family, friends, and church community all played an important role in helpingher through the challenges she faced.
“My husband was very supportive. As was my family and friends. My church family was wonderful.”
Their encouragement helped her maintain a positive attitude and reminded her how much she had to be grateful for.
Belle also found strength through prayer, exercise, and watching encouraging stories of people who had overcome cancer. She made a conscious decision to focus on hope and to maintain a positive outlook throughout her journey.
Cancer taught her an important lesson:
To prioritize what is really important.
As she faced uncertainty, her perspective shifted. The things that once seemed urgent became less significant, while faith, family, relationships, and purpose became even more meaningful.
Maintaining a positive mindset came from a deep sense of faith.
“I prayed a lot.”
She made a decision early on that whether she lived or died, she would make each day count. She chose to accept whatever God’s will was for her life and looked for opportunities to help others rather than focusing only on herself.
“I think accepting that helped me deal with everything in front of me.”
One experience early in her diagnosis had a lasting impact on her outlook. Belle and her husband were driving home from Texas before the holidays, preparing to see family for the first time since receiving her diagnosis. As they traveled, they prayed together and asked God for help in navigating the difficult conversations and emotions ahead.
Not long afterward, they got a flat tire on a dangerous stretch of interstate. While her husband struggled to remove the tire, Belle prayed for their safety as they waited on the side of the road. After some time, a man finally stopped to help.
As they talked, he asked where they had been and where they were headed. Belle shared her diagnosis with him.
The man responded firmly.
He told her that his wife had once been given a terminal lung cancer diagnosis and was told to go home and get her affairs in order. Yet years later, she had never missed a day of work and was doing well.
He told Belle not to worry.
For Belle, the encounter felt deeply meaningful.
“I felt like that was a Godwink for sure.”
Of all the people who could have stopped to help them that day, it was someone whose wife had faced a similar diagnosis and whose story carried a message of hope.
Looking back, Belle says her faith has always helped her through life’s challenges, but this experience strengthened it in a unique way.
“My faith has always been important to me and I’ve always relied on it to get me through many struggles and trials, but this is the one that showed up the most because my mortality was on the line.”
For others walking a similar path, Belle offers this encouragement:
Believe that good things can come from hard places.
Her story is a reminder that even in the midst of fear, uncertainty, and difficult treatment, hope can appear in unexpected ways—and sometimes exactly when it is needed most.
In September of 2022 I started having pain in my left hip and back. After 9 months of chiropractic, primary doctor visits, and physical therapy, I was finally able to get a CT scan which found the culprit of Stage IV, Adenocarcinoma NSCLC, Exxon 19 Deletion. I had never been a smoker, always active, and no other symptoms but the cancer had metastasized to both lungs, my spine, pelvis, and a possible spot on my liver. I spent 7 days in the hospital getting a lung biopsy, hip/pelvis biopsy, and every scan or X-ray imaginable. I was told my cancer was not curable but there were some treatments available. All I heard was “it is terminal and they can’t save me”.
Fortunately, there was a targeted therapy for my mutation and within two weeks the hip pain was almost completely gone. I read a book about a man who had chased clinical trials and lived with this for over 17 years. I was amazed that people had offered themselves to take these drugs with unknown side effects and no guarantees and it led to the drug that I was currently on, Tagrisso. It gave me some hope to help find a pill that would be like taking any other daily medicine. I agreed to try a clinical trial alongside my targeted therapy to maybe give back for what others had done for me to receive my drug that helped so much. Unfortunately, after a year on the clinical trial, legs that swelled like tree trunks, and white blood count drops, I elected to drop out of the trial drug.
I have remained on my targeted therapy Tagrisso, since diagnosis however started having issues with my right hip in October of 2024, just noticing a catch. It had become hard to climb stairs by January 2025. Scans showed a tumor had caused a compression fracture. I’ve had two rounds of radiation in 2025. By August it was decided that the cancer in my pelvis was not stable even though the soft tissue and main tumor were holding stable with no brain mets or other spread. In September I started chemotherapy of Carboplatin and Pemetrexed. I continue to have pelvis and low back pain making it difficult to walk a lot or do some physical things, but it is manageable. I have a compression fracture that will be pinned with a photodynamic nail in my right superior ramus to help stabilize my pelvis and guard against further breaks in the next few weeks.
When I look back over my journey this far, I see how blessed I’ve been. On the day I was diagnosed I saw a billboard with “Because He Lives, I Can Face Tomorrow” on it early that morning. I remember thinking that I hadn’t heard that song in forever. I sang it on repeat in my head all day and through the night at the hospital. I grew up in a family of believers and was saved at a young age. However, I have been and, in all honesty, remain in a struggle with consistency. Life is busy and it gets in the way.
I know my heart yearns for a closer walk with God and I am at my utmost peace about my relationship with God, my cancer treatments, my family, and my future when I stay focused on Jesus. I love that this group gives me a chance to share symptoms, treatments, fears, and yet more importantly, support of likeminded people who are just like me trying to find God’s will and purpose to help spread his goodness and glory even in cancer. I am the farthest thing from a perfect person or “good Christian” but I know I am forgiven and Jesus is fighting for me and we win in the end. That is enough and I can just “Be Still and Know”.
On the morning of December 26th, 2019, I had my first PET scan. After the scan my Husband and I went for breakfast. While eating breakfast I broke a tooth eating eggs. I knew this was a sign that the results were not going to be good. That afternoon we met with the Pulmonologist who told us that I had stage IV lung cancer. I was shocked, lung cancer which was such a shock and then he followed with it is treatable but not curable. Treatable was defined in months to just a few years depending on how the cancer responded to treatment. We left that appointment in shock and disbelief.
Our pastor came over and I said I feel like if I am being given cancer then God must have a reason. To this day I am not sure what the reason is however I know he is with me.
I started Chemotherapy and Immunotherapy in February of 2020. I had infusions at least every 3 weeks. I went through 8 different medications. At one point I was having some neurological issues, so an MRI of my brain was ordered. During that MRI as I lay there as still as I can trying not to cough with the cage over my head anxiety heightened an image of Jesus appeared to me. He was draped in purple cloths, and he said it will be ok. I felt such an amazing sense of calm and lift of my own spirit.
It is now 2026, I am still here. My PET scans are clear there is no cancer showing up, that MRI where Jesus appeared to me was clear. When Jesus appeared to me, I thought he meant just that MRI would be ok however he knows the journey he has me on and now I feel he knew I would be here to see my youngest son get married to see 4 Grandchildren born and to be here for all 5 of my Grandbabies.
I feel I have truly been blessed and looked forward to every day.
My diagnosis story:
Is filled with mis-attempts to get a diagnosis for inability to get a full breath. Allergy and pulmonary testing both found nothing wrong. My insistence to my primary care physician resulted in an MRI several months after first symptoms. Two tumors were pushing my windpipe closed – but only an MRI (that insurance didn’t want to do) could provide the diagnosis. By the time that happened, I was at stage 3B as the cancer had migrated to lymph nodes in my chest.
My treatment story:
After going through chemo, radiation and an immunotherapy clinical trial (that failed), all tumors appeared dead on CT scans. My oncologist ordered a biopsy to make sure. The surgeon called me after the biopsy to say that the pathologist reported “active cancer all over the place.” But my oncologist questioned the diagnosis. She said, “I’ll eat my hat if you have active cancer!” A second biopsy was ordered and the surgeon called me that night to say “we looked at your tumors from every direction. You do not have any active cancer.” My oncologist saved me from going through painful and unnecessary treatments. I love being able to say I trust my oncologist!
My Walk with God before and after diagnosis:
I was brought up in the church but had wandered away through my teens – thirties. I was just growing strong in my faith again when the cancer diagnosis came. God used what was horrible in my life to create something beautiful. I started reading the bible more thoroughly and mindfully and have grown so much closer to the Lord in the past 5 years. I totally believe that my church small group who prayed fervently is what healed my body of the cancer. My wife and I are both much more devoted to each other and the Lord today so I would not trade the experience at all!
“This organization was created from a deeply personal place. Seeing patients find comfort, clarity, and strength during their treatment journey reminds me why we started. No one should face cancer alone.”
“Every story we hear reinforces our mission. Supporting patients and families through some of their hardest days is not just our work, it is our responsibility.”