A community fundraiser has been launched to support Carolyn Nates, a Magnetawan resident who has been fighting stage 4 metastatic breast cancer for the past three years.
Nates, a former Huntsville Soccer Club member, was diagnosed with the disease in early 2023 at age 36, according to her husband Sean Spadafora. After months of unsuccessful chemotherapy, radiation, and immunotherapy in Canada, the local couple sought treatment elsewhere.
“With standard treatment options in Canada offering low chances of success. We searched for alternatives and found a clinic in Arizona whose approach gave us hope,” said Spadafora.
After beginning an integrative, personalized treatment plan in 2023, Nates saw remarkable improvements and nearly clear scans within just three months, according to Spadafora.
“Unfortunately, we quickly ran out of money and had to return to Canada,” he said. For the next year and a half, we flew from Toronto to Phoenix every two weeks for several days of treatment—each trip costing between $7,000 and $10,000.”
Spadafora said financial constraints forced them to schedule appointments further apart than recommended, resulting in 30-day gaps that allowed the cancer to grow and adapt.
Despite working seven days a week to cover medical costs and household expenses, Spadafora said he was eventually forced to transition his wife back to conventional treatment in Canada, where he said they were met by an “incredible team of doctors and nurses who cared deeply for Carolyn.”
After three months of radiation, chemotherapy, and immunotherapy, the cancer continued to spread to her spine, bones, and liver, leaving her reliant on a walker due to compression fractures in multiple vertebrae.
“With her health rapidly declining, we made the difficult and urgent decision to leave immediately and return to Arizona for full-time treatment before losing any more ground,” he said, adding that they had to borrow the last funds they could scrape together.
According to Spadafora, Nates is seeing significant improvement again; however, they’re running out of time and money.
As a result, Spadafora has launched a GoFundMe campaign to cover the costs of returning Carolyn to the Arizona clinic and ensuring she can remain there for the necessary duration of her treatment.
“Losing access to this treatment would mean losing all the progress Carolyn has fought so hard for and would allow for the disease to over take her quickly. This is our last chance and the reason we’re reaching out for help now,” he said.
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