PORTLAND, Maine — Every year, NEWS CENTER Maine partners with the Dempsey Challenge, an annual bike and road race that helps raise money to help support the Dempsey Center and the Mainers it serves.
Cancer takes a toll on a person's physical health, but it also strains a person's mental and emotional health, as well.
Because cancer impacts each health tier, people battling cancer not only need good medical care and cancer treatment, but they also need access to services that improve their overall well-being.
The Dempsey Center provides families who are battling cancer with in-between support and services they may need. Through the Dempsey Center, cancer patients and their loved ones gain access to therapy and counseling services, health, fitness and bodily wellness classes, emotional nutrition workshops, and more for free.
Athena and Rhad Davis are one of the many families who benefit from free support services offered through the Dempsey Center.
For the Davises, life isn't simple math. The couple has been together for 20 years, and they have been married for 12 of those years.
"She is unbelievably strong and beautiful," Rhad said. "I've never known anybody to be as amazing as she is, so I'm incredibly fortunate. I definitely married the right one."
Rhad said his wife Athena is a planner. The couple planned their one and only child for three years after they tied the knot.
So naturally, when doctors diagnosed Athena with HER-2 positive breast cancer three years into their marriage while she was pregnant with their daughter, her world collapsed.
Athena has been braving the health rollercoaster for eight years with her husband by her side.
"My life changed that day that I heard those three words: 'You have cancer,'" Athena said.
Athena also has stage 4 brain metastatic breast cancer, which means that the HER-2 positive breast cancer spread to her brain. She has endured radiation twice, brain surgeries, and a full mastectomy.
There is still a tumor in Athena's brain that is not in remission, and her cancer treatments recently stopped working.
For Athena, cancer has exacerbated feelings of loss, sadness, and fear. She said she feels many things have been stolen from her due to an illness she hasn't been able to get rid of.
"Is there anything that you feel like the diagnosis stole from you, that you feel like you lost yourself in a sense?" NEWS CENTER Maine's Rya Wooten asked Athena during an interview.
"Yeah, a lot. My time. The quality of my time, I should say," Athena said softly with tears filling her eyes. "Time with my daughter and my husband, because when you're sick, you're sick. When I'm sick, I'm sick. I can only speak for myself, which looks like lying in bed and everybody having life without me. That's the hard part. Feeling like I'm missing out. I don't want to miss out. I'm a people person. I don't want to miss out. I want to be there for everything. I want to try new things. I want to do new things. I want to show my daughter new things, have more experiences with my husband, and that's hard."
Unable to change the breast cancer diagnosis, Athena and Rhad are stuck on the ride together.
Despite the struggle cancer causes, Athena said the Dempsey Center has helped them meet others who know what it's like to have cancer turn your world upside down.
"As much as my family can support me, they don't have a cancer diagnosis," Athena said, explaining how joining breast cancer mom support groups has helped her work through her experiences.
The Dempsey Center's marketing and director of communications Katelynn Davis said people gain relief from the Dempsey Center.
"What we see when people come to the Dempsey Center is we see their shoulders drop," Katelyn said. "They let out a sight, and they're able to relax a little bit more. They're surrounded by people who know what they're going through."
Rhad has also participated in support groups offered through the center, because he too has had to find ways to cope with seeing the love of his life struggle against cancer.
"What the Dempsey Center has helped me do is to understand that life still happens even with cancer," Rhad said. "I would say, really in a large way, it's given me my life back. Because we can still focus on and make plans. Cancer is a part of it, but it doesn't dominate our life anymore."
Rhad and Athena continue to love each other and their daughter, while finding ways to get what cancer has stolen from them back, and they said Dempsey Center has been a large part of them finding redemption.