Mom of 3 Was Told Her Exhaustion and Headaches Were ‘Just Motherhood.’ At 28, She Was Diagnosed with Stage 4 Breast Cancer

Kate Crawford was exhausted. She was a 26-year-old mother of three children, all under the age of 3. She had constant headaches and stomachaches, and once rushed to the ER with stabbing back pain. Doctors told her, “That’s just motherhood,” recalls Crawford, now 41.

But something didn’t feel right when she did a self breast exam. She was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer when she was 28. When she was diagnosed, doctors said she had less than two years to live.

In August, Crawford — who worked as a firefighter and EMT in her hometown of Rostraver, Penn. before leaving to raise her children — had her 200^th cancer treatment. She talks to PEOPLE about her cancer journey and how she has fought to live 13 years since that diagnosis, focusing on making memories with her children.

I did not have an easy time getting pregnant. My first daughter, Shannon, passed away when she was three days old.

Shannon changed my life. I faced death with her; she died in my arms. I am afraid, but not afraid, and it’s all because of her.

I remember thinking after Shannon died, “If this ever happens again, that’s it. My life is over.” And then it happened again: I had a miscarriage at the beginning of my second trimester.

About five months after we lost that baby, I found out that I was having our twin daughters, Grace and Lily.

When they came home from the hospital, I was like, “Oh my gosh, I’m finally a mom.”

My son, Stephen Jr., did not come quietly into the world. He was about eight weeks premature. Stephen Jr. had seven different therapies, five days a week; he has since been diagnosed with a form of cerebral palsy.

When my son was born, I was cut from underneath my chest all the way down to my pelvic region. I had to have a bladder repair and a hysterectomy. I had all these medical things going on — and I was so busy, I had three kids under three!

When I started to not feel good, I just chalked everything up to, “I’m a mom, I’m really busy.” Life was so crazy and chaotic. I assumed that this was motherhood, and I was supposed to be tired all the time. But the pain got worse, and I developed a cough that wouldn’t go away.

When I went for my yearly checkup with my OB-GYN, I was like, “My breast feels a little weird and I’m tired and my back hurts.” He did an exam, and ordered a mammogram.

I remember his face was concerned. But I was like, “This could not possibly be anything.” I already had a daughter die. We had our miscarriage. I fought so hard to be a mom, and here I am finally and I’m taking care of Stephen the best that I can and raising Grace and Lily. There is no way that the universe would throw this at me.

I went for my mammogram the following week. A sweet doctor sat down next to me and said, “I’m not going to lie. I looked at your chart and I saw that you were 28 and I never in a million years would have thought that I would have saw anything on your mammogram. But I’m actually worried about what I see, so we need to schedule you for a biopsy.”

On my husband’s 41st birthday, I got the call from a nurse telling me that I had had breast cancer. I cried. I was like, “This cannot be real life.”

I met with a breast surgeon and she asked, “Is anything else going on with you?” And I was like, “Oh my gosh, no, I’m totally fine.” And my husband’s like, “Wait a minute. Actually, her back hurts really bad. She’s super tired all the time. She has this cough that won’t go away. Her stomach’s always upset.” And I looked at him and I was like, “I’m fine.” Because we think moms have to be strong and not take care of ourselves to raise the kids.

The surgeon admitted me to the hospital. That night she came into my room, she sat down on my bed and she told me that the scans showed that the breast cancer was already stage four. It was in my right shoulder and all through my right ribs. It completely covered my liver, it completely covered my pelvis, it was all through my spine and it was in both of my breasts.

My first question to her was, “Am I going to die? Am I going to leave my babies?”

She said, “We’re going to try to not let that happen.”

I told myself that even if they only gave me a 1% chance of surviving that I was going to try. If studies showed a treatment could help me, I was going to do it. I knew that a stage four diagnosis was a very, very poor prognosis.

When I first met with the oncologist, he said, “We’re going to do chemo and we’re going to hit this as hard as we can.”

So in 2013, when was 28, with three little ones at home, I started chemo. I went weekly for a year and a half. When I was first diagnosed, all I could think about was the kids. I’m like, “This has to be a joke. There’s no way that God or the universe would just tear me away from my babies.”

I created what I called “The Mommy bucket list.” I sat down with the kids, and we came up with my bucket list: big extravagant things, like go to Disney or Hawaii. And little things that I wanted to see the kids do: I wanted to teach them how to read. I wanted to see them get an A on a paper. I wanted to see them get into band. I wanted to see Stephen Jr. go to kindergarten. I wanted to see them go to prom. All the little things that I think parents might take for granted, because they’re normal things, to me, was extraordinary and I couldn’t wait to celebrate all those things.

Being able to check those things off the bucket list kept me focused on a future that I was still going to be in with my kids.

That first year, all of my friends, my family, my community that we lived in, my school district, everybody rallied around us and wanted to help me cross off this bucket list. Before the girls started kindergarten — because I thought I would not see my kids go to high school, let alone go to prom. — the high school allowed Grace, Lily and Stephen to be our school district’s first Prom Princesses and Prince. They got to walk in what we call the “Grand March” before prom, where everybody comes out in their dresses.

It was this weird paradox because I was quite literally dying on the inside, but yet experiencing all these beautiful things with my family.

When I was diagnosed they told me I had 18 to 24 months. But I started a new treatment, and we made it through a year, and then two years and three years, and then five years, and then 10 years, and then it’s going to be 13 years this upcoming January.

Every single year I have a moment where I check myself and I’m like, “Okay, what if this is the last year?” I know breast cancer will kill me one day. It just hasn’t done it yet, but it’s a matter of time.

All I want to do in my life is make memories with my family. I don’t want them to look back with sadness. I want my kids to know, even though mommy was sick, she did her best and she showed up.

I don’t want other people to feel alone in this diagnosis. I want to share with people the reality of living with cancer, because if you saw me on the street, you would have no idea. You would not be like, “Yeah, she has late-stage cancer.” But I do. I deal with pain every single day.

In 2022, my son, Stephen Jr. got really sick. I thought he was having a stroke, and I took him down to the emergency room and we actually found out that he has a brain tumor.

He’s watched me all these years as I fight to stay alive. He is able to take his diagnosis and do what he has to do. He’s so much like me. He had his little pity party after he was diagnosed in sixth grade. Then he came back fighting; everything is stable with him now.

My husband Steve is a forensic detective. He is my absolute rock. I don’t think we could do any of this without him. He supports us in all the ways that a husband and dad should support his family. I’m very thankful for him.

Stephen Jr. is now 15. The twins just turned 17,  and they are starting their senior year of high school.

I remember crying that I didn’t think I was going to see the girls go to kindergarten. And now here I am, and they’re going into their senior year.

Everybody went to prom this past year. All three of the kids went together, and it was such a full circle moment. I never thought I was going to be here to see it. My kids gave me the will to live, and I’m teaching them how to live.

Just this past week, I walked in a Cancer Culture fashion show during New York Fashion Week. It was really powerful because the pre-vivors walked first, then stage 1, 2, 3 until it got to metastatic, and we were done up with dark face makeup and Mad Max hair. It was so powerful. I was embracing my anger, and I just didn’t care who saw me, who saw my scars. I was there to make a statement and get a point across, and it was just such a beautiful way to tell that story.

The older I get, I don’t necessarily write these experiences down on my “bucket list” per se. If an opportunity were to present itself, I’d say “Absolutely!” but I don’t want to plan for it, because you don’t know. I don’t know where I’ll be or next year. So you have to just kind of grip life and live it.  

Bad things happen and there’s no rhyme, there’s no reason. I searched for all those. I wanted to know why all these bad things happened. And now when I look back on everything, I tell myself that no matter what happens, everything’s going to turn out okay.

Definitely this is not the life that I envisioned for myself, but sometimes I’ll be driving down the road and I’ll look over at one of the kids, or I’m in the backyard feeding my ducks, and I’m like, “Man, what a great life.” My kids gave me the will to live, and I’m teaching them how to live. This is such a beautiful life, and I just can’t believe that I’m even given the opportunity to be on this earth and live it.