Mrs. Miller? This is Clara from the billing and compliance department at the university oncology center. We are performing an audit of your old account from 2022, and we need to discuss a document signed by your husband during your treatment.

The voice on the other end of the line was very quiet, very professional. I sat in my kitchen in Grand Rapids, Michigan, staring out at the small tomato patch in the yard. My hands started to shake. I had to set my coffee mug down on the counter before I spilled it.

I need to back up for a second. You have to understand how we got here.

David and I had been married for 14 years. We weren’t wealthy, but we had a stable life. I worked as a billing coordinator at a local dental office, and David was a sales manager at an auto parts distributor. I was always the organized one. I kept a blue spiral notebook with a worn cardboard cover on our kitchen counter. I wrote down everything in it. Grocery lists, utility bills, our little vacation fund. We were saving up for a trip to northern Michigan. I spent my weekends cleaning, cooking, and making sure his shirts were pressed for Monday morning. I took care of him because that is what you do when you love someone.

Then, in the summer of 2022, the lump appeared. Stage 3 breast cancer.

At first, David cried. He held me on the living room sofa and promised we would fight it together. He came to my first two chemotherapy sessions. He sat in the vinyl chair, playing games on his phone while the red medicine dripped into my chest port. But by the third session, he had an excuse. A client dinner. By the fourth, he didn’t even call.

I spent 8 months in that sterile room alone. My hair fell out in clumps. I remember standing in the bathroom, watching the dark strands slip down the drain, feeling so small I thought I might disappear. My weight dropped from 140 pounds to 98. I was too weak to even write in my blue notebook. It sat on my nightstand, gathering dust. Our bank accounts were draining, and David kept complaining about the cost of my prescriptions.