There is only so much strife a person can handle. Most would give up after being told their liver has failed, and later they would be diagnosed with breast cancer. Rosemary Droszcz did not surrender to the situation life presented her. She endured and will be participating in Vallejo’s Relay for Life on Saturday.
Droszcz’s journey to the Relay for Life begins in Sacramento where she met her husband of 30 years. During their days off from work, Droszcz and her husband would visit Benicia. In 2012, the couple decided to move to the city, where Droszcz would join a local gym and integrate herself within the community.
Droszcz says she has always been a workaholic, and the only time she has ever entered a hospital was to give birth to her children. This changed in 2015 after attending a wedding in Colorado and beginning to not feel well. Droszcz would go to the doctor for a checkup to see what might be wrong. The doctor informed Droszcz she had liver failure. Droszcz, having never done drugs or being much of a drinking person, asked her doctor why this happened. The doctor told her sometimes things like this just occur, and it was a mystery.
Droszcz went to Stanford University Medical Center and was put on the liver transplant list. Doctors at Stanford told her there was not much they could do for her and sent her home. A strange thing occurred though. Droszcz began to feel better, and her liver began fixing itself. One year later in October, Droszcz required gall bladder removal surgery. She recovered, but in March the other shoe was about to drop.
Having been through a medical odyssey, Droszcz decided to have several checkups done to make sure she was still in good health. Her eye doctor found she had Horner syndrome, which causes drooping of upper eyelids and blurry vision. Usually cancer or tumors can cause Horner syndrome. Droszcz’s doctors decided she should get some MRIs. Doctors would find out Droszcz had breast cancer.
“Cancer is like an octopus with tentacles,” she said. “It goes out reaches and affects all the people that you love and people that you know. It affects your kids and your husband and your life. It consumes you. It’s a really horrid disease. I know breast cancer is one of the most curable. It really gives you an emotional meltdown.”
Droszcz began treatment soon after her diagnosis. She chose to have lumpectomy over mastectomy because the latter would require more surgeries than Droszcz would want to go through. Last week was Droszcz’s most recent radiation treatment.
“The Sutter Cancer Center over in Vallejo, those people are the most fantastic, wonderful people that I have ever meet in my life,” Droszcz said. “They’re so supportive, from Doctor Seid, Karen, the nurse navigator to the radiation technicians that put you in the machines and shoot you with the radiation to the receptionist. They’re all amazing.”
Both Droszcz and her husband are now a part of support groups for cancer patients and caretakers. Droszcz said she and her husband have found these meetings to be helpful to them.
“Going through this journey has been so enlightening,” she said. “I have so much more information. The people that you meet, you really count your blessings that you met all these wonderful people. It’s like a garden that’s blooming with new flowers every day from the people that you met. You end up counting your blessings that you are very lucky to be alive and to have met these wonderful people.”
Droszcz said she has contacted the American Cancer Society and asked how she can volunteer in any way after she recovers both emotionally and physically from the impacts of cancer. The upcoming race will be her first Relay for Life, and Droszcz says she does not know what to expect, but she is looking forward to it.
The Benicia Vallejo Relay for Life will be held at 10 a.m., Saturday, Aug. 5 at St. Patrick-St. Vincent High School, located at 1500 Benicia Road in Vallejo. For more information, or to sign up or donate, go to main.acsevents.org/site/TR/RelayForLife/RFLCY17CA?pg=entry&fr_id=79044 or email Dana Taylor at dana.taylor@cancer.org.

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