Amy Graff, her husband and youngest daughter moved to a new home in Hobart a month and a half before she was diagnosed with cancer. / Warren Gerds/Press-Gazette
I just started a new job last year. When I was diagnosed with breast cancer, I worried: Would I lose my job? Would I lose my home?Broadway 
Automotive on Military Avenue, they told me, "Please don't worry. Yes, we know it's serious. We will do everything in our power. We want you here." I'm the only saleswoman, and they have 30-some salesmen. My original plan with the new chemo treatment was to work maybe four days a week. The concern was — sales being a pretty physical job in a car dealership — that I wouldn't be quite ready for that yet. Broadway set up different duties, responsibilities, schedules and work environment for the time being until I can do full-time sales again.
My original plan with the new chemo treatment was to work maybe four days a week. The concern was — sales being a pretty physical job in a car dealership — that I wouldn't be quite ready for that yet. Broadway set up different duties, responsibilities, schedules and work environment for the time being until I can do full-time sales again.
The people at Broadway have been real great at helping me through this. Many of them have known someone close to them who have gone through cancer or breast cancer, and they're very empathetic to my situation and told me they want me back.
When I did financial planning, one of the products that you sell is disability insurance. Most people when you ask them about it — "Ahh, I'm healthy. I'll be fine. Don't need it. Tsssh." It's usually 60 bucks a month. If you think about that, and you think about where I am right now — imagine. I had the short-term disability. I did not have the long-term disability. Should have. I had to actually let my individual disability policy go a few years ago when my husband, Jim, and I went through some tough times financially.
I would encourage people to take out long-term disability. It's amazing to me, someone as healthy as me, is sitting here on disability right now. Wakeup call. Everybody out there, go get yourself long-term disability insurance to protect your family.
My friends stepped up. I've had five people come to me who knew my situation, who knew my concerns, and they said, "We're going to have a fundraiser in May for whatever you need it for – if you need to pay your mortgage or if you need to pay medical bills – but we're going to do this." It's staggeringly overwhelming to think that I have so many people who care about me. I've had many friends who have taken me to and from appointments.
Jim has taken me to a few, but every time he does he has to take a day off at work. We're relying on his income more than ever because I don't have much. I have a disability check, but it's half of what my pay was, and then the first thing I have to do is turn around and pay $592 a month back for insurance. So it isn't that much, and it ends at the end of March.
My car payment was the same as my insurance payment, around $500. I sold my car so that I can pay my health insurance.
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