JUNCTION CITY (KSNT)- A Junction City woman is facing an unexpected battle at the young age of 30-years-old, on top of that, she’s also balancing the priorities of being a wife and a mother of four.

Rachel Forbus is a mom of four and a military wife who has now added one more thing to her plate: fighting non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma. Rachel found out she had cancer after her 30th birthday. She went into the hospital for the pain she was having in her hip which also caused her to not be able to walk.

“The cancer gave me, essentially, what’s called lesions, she said. “And the lesions started to eat away at my bone density and had weakened the bone in my hip. To a point where it eventually just broke under its own weight in pressure.”

The cancer had also spread to other parts of her body. In a short time frame, Rachel went from not being able to walk, to finding out it was cancer and then getting a hip replacement, all at 30-years-old. While she was in the hospital there was only one thing she couldn’t stop thinking about.

“Over and over again, don’t take me away from my babies,” she said. “Don’t take me away from my kids. That’s all I could think about. And it’s…it’s still what goes through my head, more days than not. I’m not worried about myself. I don’t care about my hair, I don’t care about what happens to my body. I just don’t want to leave my kids.”

Chris Forbus is her husband. He was in the military and knows a thing or two about fighting tough battles. But for him, he’s never seen anything scarier than this.

“Truth be told, when she first told me, the very first thing that I felt was scared,” Chris said. “And quite honestly, having been deployed to a combat zone, this is scarier than anything I’ve witnessed there.”

As the Forbus family was in and out of appointments and procedures, someone else stepped in to help. Rachel’s friend Desiree Granstra. Desiree thought feeding the family shouldn’t be another thing on the list to worry about. So, she started a meal train. People from all around the community signed up to deliver dinners for them, taking another concern off their plate and, instead, adding some good home-cooked meals to it.

“I needed to do something that would help in any way that I could,” Desiree said. “Because I can’t imagine what she is going through, I can empathize but I can’t imagine being at her age and what she is going through. So I wanted to try and do what I could for her.”

People have rallied together to help this family of six, cooking meals and even donating money as Rachel Forbus takes down non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

“I can’t even describe it,” Chris said. “With the extra help coming from our friend, and setting up the GoFundMe and the meal train, bringing that food in. Honesty, as soon as I knew about it, it literally brought tears. I’ve never seen this level of support.”

“I don’t feel like I have the words to convey how thankful we are,” Rachel said.

Rachel cannot work at this time so the family has gone to one income. If you would like to donate, click here.

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