Diagnosed with cancer of the same type as Terry Fox’s, a mild sarcoma in her right calf, athlete and Sept-Îles TS, Joannie Lebrun, underwent 25 treatments of radiation therapy over 5 weeks. She will soon be operated on. In the meantime, she is organizing a 25-day fundraising campaign to raise funds for research into this type of cancer still unknown to scientists.
Admiring the works of artist Isabelle Carignan, Joannie sells sweaters, bags and posters with the reproduction of a painting that is meaningful to her. The 32-year-old mother of a 2-year-old boy is as generous as she is courageous in this adventure.
scary cancer
“She woke up one morning with the idea of organizing a fundraiser. After the diagnosis, even the specialist doctors could not give us much information about this cancer. It was the unknown in the beginning that was the hardest for Joannie and her family,” says her mother Marlyne Lebrun.
Joannie is known in Sept-Îles for her sporting achievements as a soccer player, hockey goalkeeper and crossfit champion. She was in the Top 50 in Canada in this discipline until 2016.
“We always believe our young athletes are safe, but cancer doesn’t see it that way,” says Marlyne Lebrun, who is involved in her daughter’s initiative to help fund cancer research in the type of sarcoma.
Trials and hope
“Joannie faced the difficulties with great courage. The fear of the unknown at the beginning, the reorganization of family life, the possibility of having a leg amputated… Today she is hopeful, but there is still the possibility of losing the courage that allows her to slow down”, worries her mother.
Ahead of her operation in Quebec on Dec. 6, La Septilienne is campaigning on behalf of the McGill University Sarcoma Foundation, which partners with a global network of researchers on this soft tissue cancer. The public can write to him in a private message on his Facebook Joanna Lebrun TS.
