Emily Upton Penn

Emily's Story

My name is Emily Upton Penn.

I’m a mom to Heidi, Bayze, and Parker, and I’ve been married to my husband, Shane, for 13 years. In 2016, we moved to Newburgh, Indiana, because my husband was currently working (on a long contract) at the plant in Rockport, IN.

Before April 2022, I was healthy my entire life.

On March 31, I thought I had a normal UTI. Two days later, doctors removed my kidney—and with it, my sense of normal functioning life. I was diagnosed with Monophasic Synovial Sarcoma, an extremely rare and aggressive cancer. Not long after, I was told it was stage 4 and that I had only weeks to live without treatment.

We were sent to UMMC in Jackson, Mississippi, where I started chemotherapy. I don’t even remember what that first dose was—everything was happening so fast. A few days later, I developed a cough and mentioned it to my oncologist. He looked at me and said, “I have a cough too.”

That moment changed everything.

On the advice of a friend, we made a four-hour drive to Birmingham, Alabama, where I met Dr. Vanessa Eulo. She told me something I will never forget: she doesn’t do timelines. She immediately started me on the AIM chemotherapy regimen—Adriamycin (Doxorubicin), Ifosfamide, and Mesna.

The next year is mostly a blur of hospital stays, treatments, exhaustion, and survival. But on October 29, 2022, after six rounds of AIM, I went into remission. After being told I had almost no time left, there was no explanation other than God.

We stayed in Mississippi another year so my mom, dad, stepmom, sister, and family could help care for me and our kids while I healed, slept, and slowly came back to life. Shane worked far away to keep our insurance, home, and family financially intact. When I was finally well enough, we made the decision to move back home to Indiana, where our children had grown up. We bought a house unseen and moved in September 2024.

In October 2024, I drove back to UAB for what I thought would be my last appointment with Dr. Eulo. Instead, she found a lung nodule that had grown large enough to biopsy. It came back malignant, and the others (lung nodules) are assumed to be as well.

Now, I travel every 60 days to St. Louis for scans to see whether my cancer is growing or shrinking. Right now, it is stable—and has even shrunk.

Cancer is expensive. It comes out of nowhere and places enormous burdens on one person and one family. I’ve never worked outside the home—Shane has always provided while I raised our children—and facing this reality has been terrifying. We have made it by the grace of God and an amazing community I was raised in to get where we are now.

I’ve been so afraid this might be my last year, even though I know God is in control.

That’s why I am so deeply grateful for CourtStrong, who helped make this Christmas unbelievably beautiful for my children—at a time when I needed hope more than anything.

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