Tara Rutledge

 Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated in one place. We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement. Thank you for visiting. 


Our story began  exactly 15 years ago in the Spring of 2007. I was diagnosed with a Leiomyosarcoma of my left arm. This type of cancer is very rare and I had quite the adventure that summer going through multiple surgeries, radiation and chemo.  I was told I was in remission,  I returned to work in October of that year and continued to work until I retired September 2020.


Even though we were in the middle of a pandemic, that first year of retirement was awesome. We sold the beach house and spent the next year having so much fun updating our home of 30 years.  It was a lot of work, but last Fall, my back began giving me some grief. I knew I had a couple of discs that were bulging and when I over did things,  I would find myself in pain.  But the pain didn't go away this time with  the usual treatment. 


So I decided it was time for a physical. It had been awhile due to Covid and how the pandemic changed and impacted our lives.  We were lucky enough to see a new physician who said it was time for an xray.  I went for the xray the following Monday. When the phone rang a few short hours later and I was told I had "lytic lesions" on my 4th Lumbar vertebrae...I knew we were in trouble and our lives were in for some major changes...