Elissa Kalver was 34 when she found a lump in her breast. She had no family history of cancer and had just welcomed her first child. She assumed the lump was a cyst. But when she went to get it checked out, doctors found another lump in her armpit. Biopsies found that both lumps were malignant.

More tests found the situation was worse than she could have imagined: a PET scan found cancer in her lower spine and liver. She was diagnosed with HER2-positive metastatic breast cancer. Diseases that have spread as far as Kalver's are considered incurable, according to the Cleveland Clinic .

"I was told I wasn't going to die tomorrow, but I was told that there was an 80% chance that I would die within five years," Kalver said. "The first oncologist I had, to uplift me, was like, 'Well, I have

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