Fired Up For Crown Heights and Klal Yisroel
When an enemy lives in your midst. When a noxious tumor threatens your very life. When an illness, a disease, a cancerous darkness terrorizes your life, the only way to fight it, overcome it, obliterate it, and ascend victorious over it, is to have a team, a community, a family that is FIRED UP!
As Tzipporah will tell you, RCCS is that team, that community, that family.
We all go to the doctor for well-visits. As their name implies, well-visits usually end well. We receive a bill of good health and go home, returning to regular, normal life. In 2019, Tzipporah went for a well-visit. This one didn’t end so well. When Tzipporah went home, her world was turned upside down. The doctors found a tumor.
When a tumor is found you become completely lost. When a foreign growth is discovered you begin to shrink.
First come the biopsies. Sometimes, they are inconclusive, a euphemism for “we don’t know what’s going on.” Which makes the challenge so much harder. When you know your enemy you can go to battle to destroy it; you know which munitions are required to eradicate it. But when your enemy is concealed underground everything becomes more difficult.
This tumor was not innocent. It was a proactive invader. Its toxic nature was inflicting excruciating pain upon Tzipporah. Every day that passed without a diagnosis was terrible.
A mother of five wonderful children, Tzipporah had to manage a family while something was eating away at her. Where to turn? What to do? Who can help?
On a Friday before Shabbos, Tzipporah was talking to two friends of hers. They told Tzipporah that she must call RCCS.
Tzipporah didn’t want to. Tzipporah was afraid to. A call to RCCS makes it real. Perhaps if I ignore it it will ignore me. Perhaps if I don’t acknowledge it it will go away.
That never happens. When an enemy is left to fester, it doesn’t stop festering until it consumes you. Cancerous growths don’t stop growing until you erase them from existence.
Over Shabbos, Hashem’s day of peace, when we return to our purest state, Tzipporah and her husband discussed what to do. They decided there was no other way. They must contact RCCS.
After Shabbos, Tzipporah’s father-in-law called R’ Moshe Klein. Rabbi Klein-Tzipporah-with RCCS. Yides, a soul-dedicated RCCS patient advocate, would become Tzipporah’s lifeline, her friend, as close as family.
From this moment on, RCCS took charge. Up until now, Tzipporah was being attacked. Now, with RCCS guiding her path and Yides holding her hand, Tzipporah began to fight back. They were FIRED UP! It was time to take the battle to the tumor.
Within four days, Tzipporah was sitting in the Memorial Sloan Kettering office with three top-of-the-line specialists, including a world leading oncological surgeon. The doctor performed another biopsy. He was kind and caring; Tzipporah could tell that though it was very serious, he did everything possible not to scare her.
Yides was there the moment the appointment ended, following up and ensuring Tzipporah had everything she needed.
A week later, home with her baby, she got called with the results. It was leiomyosarcoma. Surgery was urgent and imminent.
A roller coaster of emotions overwhelms you the moment you receive a clear diagnosis. On one hand you’re happy to define the enemy; yet, simultaneously, the threat becomes almost too real to handle. What should I do? How do I do it? Who will take care of my kids? Who will pay for these astronomical medical bills?
There’s only one way: you must have a partner, a dedicated team of experts, an organization that is FIRED UP to help you and fires you up to heal and overcome. RCCS jumped right in, lining up all the doctors and medical records, navigating all the insurance complications, streamlining the many moving parts—all while ensuring that the emotional and practical needs of Tzipporah and her family were being met.
Tzipporah could barely move at this point. She was rushed to the Sloan Kettering where RCCS expedited everything. Surgery lasted for 8 hours. It was complicated. The complications affected Tzipporah for two years. Through it all, RCCS and Yides were family.
RCCS serves as guardians, FIRED UP without fail for the wellbeing of Klal Yisroel.
As is too often the case when dealing with such a persistent enemy, the story does not end here. Two years later, Tzipporah went for a routine test at a local clinic. Some concerning signs surfaced. RCCS was there immediately. Chava, another RCCS soul-dedicated advocate, another new family member, led the way this time.
It was the same old, same old. Only it wasn’t. It was a whole new case, dealing with a whole new set of circumstances, another part of the body, and a totally different form of threat.
Only two things were in common: it was a cancerous threat on Tzipporah’s life; and RCCS was just as FIRED UP as ever to help lead Tzipporah to victory!
Another biopsy. Another frantic wait. Another anxious round of worries: who will be there for my family, my kids, my husband, the bills, the confusion—the known, unknown, and everything in between!
Sadly, the results were not benign: it was a carcinoma.
Not sadly, RCCS was there. Chava connected Tzipporah to the best oncologist and surgeon specializing in her unique case. Other doctors were available earlier. RCCS directed Tzipporah to wait a few extra days to ensure the best doctor was on her case.
When asked to describe RCCS through it all, Tzipporah said, “RCCS is like my family. They are there, always, no matter time, circumstances, or anything. But more than biological family, they are experts in this field; their entire being is FIRED UP for one purpose and one goal: to ensure that any Jew with this illness can overcome with hope and heal with confidence.”
Tzipporah invited her RCCS team to her son’s Bar Mitzvah. She was scheduled to have a biopsy on that day. When she came home, instead of depression and confusion, Tzipporah found a gorgeous platter of chocolates sitting at her front door.
It was from RCCS.
When she called to thank them, Tzipporah let them know that she sent the Bar Mitzvah invitations because RCCS, Yides and Chava, are her family, not because she wanted chocolates.
Their response says it all: “We sent the chocolates before we received any invitations. We are your family. We are here for you, then, now, always!”
Sadly yene machla exists. When dealing with something like yene machla, you MUST have all the support and help you can get. You MUST be FIRE UP. You need the best. There is no other option. RCCS is your family, your advocate, 24/7, having RCCS there is beyond anything Tzipporah could have imagined. Having RCCS there for all of us is the only way we can fight back against this terrible illness and remove it from our midst.
Today, Tzipporah is Baruch Hashem in remission, cancer clear and a strong survivor. Like all survivors, Tzipporah goes for annual tests with RCCS holding her hand every step of the way. As with every family, the bonds forged in fire last for a lifetime.
AS WE SPEAK, RCCS IS CURRENTLY HELPING AND POWERING OVER 100 OF OUR CROWN HEIGHTS NEIGHBORS AND THEIR FAMILIES, DEDICATING $504,168 DOLLARS EXCLUSIVELY TO OUR GREAT COMMUNITY.
If you or anyone you know is FIRED UP to help Klal Yisroel, FIRED UP to take on the critical role of an RCCS ambassador in our FIRED UP AUCTION, please go to rccsauction.org/firedup?join=show.
Thank you for being fired up and lighting up the world!
Go to https://rccsauction.com/firedup/crownheights to choose your auction tickets today!
Together, we will light the flame of hope for Cholei Yisroel.
