Team Gabby Team Page

Hi Everyone!

+ Thank you for visiting my Team Fundraising page to support the "Stepping Out to Cure Scleroderma" event!

+ Donating through this site is simple, fast and totally secure. It is also the most efficient way to make a contribution to support my team’s effort to raise funds for people living with scleroderma. To make a donation, click on one of the team members to make a gift towards their fundraising effort to help our team.

+ If you would like to join our team and help raise funds, please click on “Join My Team” and follow the directions.

Our team sincerely appreciates your support, and we ask you to please share this with anyone who you think might want to help.

Help our team bring more awareness to scleroderma so we can find a cure!

If you're interesting in joining our team and/or attending the walk, below are the details!

When: July 9th, 2022

Where: Genesse Valley Park

Time: 9am registration starts, 10 am walk starts! 

My Story:

I am 27 years old and I've been battling this disease for quite some time now.
It has officially been 20 years of this journey with Scleroderma!

A little info, Scleroderma is an auto-immune disease that affects the skin and connective tissue, either locally or throughout the body. For me personally, Scleroderma has mainly affected my lungs, heart and skin! At the beginning of my diagnosis my skin was the main problem. Being diagnosed with Raynaud's first it became really problematic through the years with constant digital ulcers on my fingers, infections because of these ulcers, and a partial finger amputation down the line...but hey it adds character right?

My lungs became another big issue and my lung capacity began to decline pretty rapidly throughout the years. It is currently at about 37%. Now that doesn't sound the best BUT it has improved in the past 6 years after receiving my Stem Cell Transplant in January 2016 at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago. The improvements may be small but they're still victories!

This Stem Cell Transplant is something I am SO incredibly thankful for. Without it, I wouldn't be here and I am the healthiest I have been in a long time thanks to the transplant. Yay!!!

In late 2015 before the transplant my lungs were going downhill and while I was going through the mobilization process leading up to the transplant I was surprised with some news. My heart was in the beginning stages of heart failure and that news meant that we needed to look at our options and we had two of those.

Option 1 - abort the transplant process and live out what they thought would be maybe, at best, a year.

Option 2 - take the leap with a new and different protocal, one that hadn't been done before on someone with a heart condition like my own. This was a very risky option as the doctors were unsure if my heart would be able to handle the stress the transplant would put on it.

I trusted the process and was 98% sure my body was going to handle it just fine. Was it scary? Yes! But here we are today, almost 6 1/2 years later...improved lung function, no more heart failure!! In fact, within days after the stem cells were transplanted back into my body is the day my heart healed! I'll tell ya... stem cells do amazing things!

If you made it this far, thank you for listening to my story! I am incredibly grateful for all of my family and friends that have supported me and given me the strength through everything.

Xo

Gabby