Welcome to Bee Mariposa Sparks

My name is Jasmin and I built this platform to have a voice, to tell my story and to help others who experience hardships. My goal in starting this website is to raise money to help others as they go through an illness. The last thing a person needs is to stress or worry about your financial matters. Life keeps living and doesn't stop because of a loss or an illness. In life we need a support system, so when you are faced with challenges, we know we are not alone. If you look at a family with a strong support system, their family members thrive and are more successful. Of course there is maybe that one family member that continues on their maybe not so great path despite the support. But even knowing when the person wants to come around the support is there. This makes all the world of difference. In the future this will expand to bigger things, but for now I will focus on the current scenario, "Cancer".

This word has no significant meaning until it hits or takes someone you love. I remember my first time this word changed it's impact on me. It was maybe close to 25 years ago when my uncle was diagnosed with cancer. It started in his ankle and by the time he went to the doctor, it had already metastasized all over his body, plus his lungs. This was the big one because this was where the cancer killed him. His lungs were filled with tumors and is what killed him at age 41. He left behind a daughter, his wife and all of us, his family. He didn't have insurance, he was classified as a independent contractor for his job and that was how an employer was able to get away without providing insurance. After his diagnoses of the cancer, he was refused treatment due to it not being a life threatening emergency. He went precious time without any treatment due to the lack of insurance. Our medical system proved to me at this time that they do not give a crap about people. No money or insurance, means no care. Well unless you are gushing blood, in the middle of a heart attack or anything life threatening that needs life saving procedures. Although my uncle felt it was life saving to receive care immediately. There was something in him that was going to kill him. After sometime, he couldn't work and then finally was approved for AHCCCS. Unfortunately, to late and he passed away a couple months later. I am not saying that if he would have started treatment as soon as his diagnosis that it would have saved him, no that's not what I'm saying.

In addition to our failing medical care, we have to face the challenges of our food and environment that is poisoning us slowly. Cancer treatment is toxifying our bodies just before the point of death, in hopes to kill the cancer. But the treatment is also killing you in other ways. It is a sad, sad situation and what do you do. Our natural instinct is to live! So when we are faced with death, we fight and then become desperate as nothing works. Now there are all kinds of alternative methods that could cure cancer, but are you willing to risk your life that it will cure you, cause that is what you are doing. But we are also rolling the dice on our western medicine to cure you, why? Because through the nightmare process of treatment, there has been cures, if the cancer has been caught soon enough. Soon this is the safer bet. There are not clinical studies in alternative methods, unknown precise regiments, what works for which types of cancers. Such as type of cancer hormone, genetic, etc. and where the cancer is at and how progressed it is. Just so many factors to know exactly what would work. So we for sure roll the dice with the professionals, the best bet, this is who we trust.

But what happens when our medical system fails us, then what? The reason I started this blog, was due to what I experienced with my mom. In December of 2025, we received the official diagnosis of my moms cancer. She was diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer and the type of cancer she has, is what they called Triple Negative cancer. Statistics say that it is in 10-15% of breast cancer patients and it means this type is one of the most aggressive types of cancers. We were told if she did not fight this aggressively, with immune therapy, chemo, surgery, radiation and then another round of chemo, then she would only have 6 months to live, give or take. So what do we do? This specialist in oncology is giving my mom a death sentence, based on his medical expertise. Despite our feelings on chemo and what we have seen do to our family members, what choice do we have? Alternative treatments have no nothing and we not willing to risk my moms life. So she began immune therapy and chemo.

On her very first treatment she received her first dose of Keytruda (immune therapy) and her first does of chemo (2 types). We heard of this freeze packs, where you place it on your head, hands and feet during the time you are receiving the chemo. The purpose of this is to slow your blood flow with the ice packs in place on the head, hands, and feet to prevent more of the chemo going into these areas. This was said to help with the hair loss and for the limbs to prevent neuropathy. Within three weeks her hair started falling out and she still lost all her hair. She began feeling tingling and a jitter in her hands and started to drop things here and there. So, that didn't work. She was receiving Keytruda once every three weeks and her chemo was every week. Then the co-pays started.

Usually when you make a purchase, you are aware of the cost and have the ability to shop around. I know this may not be the nest comparison or analogy but with this medical treatment, if you are not on AHCCCS, you have a ton of out of pocket costs. There is no shopping for the best deal, you are just told and way above your negotiation grade level. With her insurance, every chemo treatment cost her about $400 a week, the Keytruda was $2000 every third week and this is not including all the imaging, weekly blood work and or costs for seeing the specialists weekly. Her costs were almost up to $4000 to $5000 a month. As her chemo progressed, complications started. First it was her white blood count dropped, so low that they canceled her chemo for that week. They scheduled her for these injections to help her body force the production of white blood cells. She was scheduled for one shot on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. Each one of these injections also had a co-payment of a couple hundred dollars. Her white blood cells went up and so did her liver enzymes.

With her enzymes on the rise, my mom received a call on the next Monday to hurry and get to the hospital as soon as possible, due to her liver enzymes were now at life threatening numbers. Meaning my mom was now in liver failure. The doctor did prescribe her prednisone over the weekend. But my mom was now not trusting the doctor and what they were giving her. She was essentially a little paranoid, with good reason. Once she started receiving the injections her liver enzymes began to spike. She has no clue what is the cause and or why she is going into liver failure. This is really serious and a call to her would have been ideal as she was going into liver failure. She was leery of taking the prescribed prednisone and wanted to know what was happening before she did. I told her to at least take one or two of the pills and google was not able to tell us anything. As she was now relying on google to tell her what was going on with her.

In the hospital, all we saw on TV was Keytruda commercials and we commented on how it is coming up so much. She was hospitalized for 4 days and still no clear answers. One doctor did say it was her immune therapy that caused the liver failure. Although, it began after the injections to increase her white blood cells. She was discharged and now the following week and on our way to see the oncologist, finally! There we finally got an explanation, only after a week long guessing game. The doctors in the hospital, deferred more questions we had to her oncologist. Now we are here with our questions in hand. Basically the Keytruda is the reason for the immune attack to her liver. Keytruda is designed to program you plasma cells to attack T-cells (cancer), which is good in theory if that is all it does. What also happened was Keytruda also programed my moms immune system to attack her liver. My mom asked how long this drug stays in here, he explained it has already left her system nut these are the affects of keytruda, soooo that means what?? He continues to state that these affects of Keytruda are permanent. I asked how many people this happens to and he said one in every hundred people. So when they explained this immune therapy to us, they told us my mom was curable with this treatment and failed to mention 1 out 100 people can have this affect, which is huge. Now my mom has an auto immune disease that will kill before the cancer, if they are not able to safely switch her off the prednisone to the CellCept medication that she will have to be on for the rest of her life. Prednisone is not or can not be used long term and she has begun this winging off the prednisone, to just remain on the CellCept medication that she is already on. Oh and just FYI, this medication co-payment is $89, bi-weekly. We were given some papers with the side effects of the Keytruda and all the chemos, which we were aware some were pretty severe, like death. Although, you are desperate not to die and you have someone telling you without this treatment, you only have 6 months give or take to live. I just think to myself, how hard would it have been for the doctor to verbally say, 1 out 100 people can develop an auto immune disease caused by Keytruda. Just because this is a high rate of this happening to people.

Being a doctor is difficult, especially when you are dealing with people's lives. But that is the reason they get paid a ton, as it is a hard job that you are responsible for people's lives. Our medical system is slowly worsening, short staff, less explanations, costs are unjustifiable and it is a dictatorship. This is our dictatorship and what we rely on to save us. We pay into the medical system for all our working lives and then an illness hits and we are raped! They drain us of our finances and then if they don't kill us with the drugs they give us, we then have permanent side affects. You get on thing cured/fixed only to have something else wrong with you from the medications that were given to you and that you had to pay for. This is the only system we have where us as the consumer has no choice on the price, its either name brand or generic, chose this provider or switch. Obviously there is no magic cure to every disease or illness, although the human touch is being lost. How are our medical system not treating us like humans, instead we are numbers or an illness. Part of the reason is they are understaffed and we literally are a number with a diagnosis.

As my mom was going through this journey of all of this treatments, she was healthy for the most part, rarely went to the doctor. Work for the City for 25 years, contributed to her medical and retirement. She lives on a budget but is comfortable and has a savings. In the short time her treatments were in effect, her savings was getting drained. I am not stating this as a fact, but this is what was being felt, like the medical treatments were draining her finances and she paid $6000 for them to give her another illness of an auto immune disease. As I watched this, I thought this is so sad and ridiculous that she is losing everything for over priced treatments. The oncologist said something, that I have not had time to question him, but he said the affects of Keytruda are permanent so why do you need to continuously receive it once every 3 weeks, if with a treatment she is already done. Why would they continue to pump more into her or anyone at $2000 a pop. Is it to continue to make more and more money, this doesn't make sense to me. The $2000 a treatment was only the co-payment, I don't know the whole cost. But why would she need to continue with multiple treatments, when after the first, second or third treatment, what Keytruda has done its job in reprograming the plasma cells. Also it messes with your brain and causes all kind of mood issues, just like the paranoia my mom was experiencing. This medication is no joke. I was really angry with the oncologist and I did tell him, I understand you have a lot of patients, although going into liver failure is a big ordeal and a simple phone call would have went a long way, he said yes i understand and know that this is her first time, even though this may be standard protocol for him. But I realized he is just the face of my anger. It is not him who created this drug, who is advertising the heck out of this drug, it is bigger then just him.

There needs to be a change in our medical system, although it may not happen, but what is most important to me is helping families who are going through this. Normal bills don't stop, new bills are occuring, and information is in lack. After we were giving the side effects papers we looked at them and googled more, this was not in there that we could find prior to taking the Keytruda. The best way I can help, is to create a foundation to where we can sell products, receive donations, you can read our story, follow us on social media, provide information and resources. This is the best way to support a change.