Christmas Comes Early for Plainfield Cancer Survivor

It was shaping up to be a lousy Christmas.

Natalie Martello, a 20-year resident of Plainfield, is currently battling leukemia, although she’s in remission. Her father-in-law passed away Dec. 21, close to the date her husband passed away a year ago from melanoma. On top of it all, she wasn’t sure if she would be able to provide her family with a Christmas.

But she got a very welcome surprise Monday night as Gerri Neylon of Christmas Without Cancer and March4Meg Board President Jim Barry presented Martello with some Christmas cheer.

Not only did they provide her with a check for a Cobra medical insurance payment, they presented her with gift cards and toiletries.

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“We are very lucky, even though we’ve had some bad luck, we are very lucky,” Martello said, the oversized blue check resting on her lap.

Words can’t express what the gestures mean to her. It’s been difficult being a single mother to four kids: Eileen, 17, Teddy, 12, William, 10 and Charlie, 8, who will also benefit from the generosity.

“They’re grateful, too, and they know how they can’t always get what other kids get,” she said.

While some could call this a Christmas miracle, it started when a friend of Martello’s referred her to Christmas Without Cancer, who contacted Martello.

“It’s amazing how many people have reached out to us and have helped us,” she said. “We wouldn’t have been able to get through this without them.”

“Them” refers not only to Neylon and Barry, but to her co-workers within various departments of the City of Naperville.

“A lot of people donated their time to me for me to be off after my husband passed away and for me to be off when I was diagnosed. They got nothing in return. They just gave their time to me,” Martello said.

Perhaps it’s her positive attitude that’s been giving her strength and perseverance.

“It can always be worse,” she said.

Jim Barry, of March4Meg, a melanoma awareness group, has been using his financial resources to help families in need.

While March4Meg has always raised money for melanoma research, the organization is expanding to directly rescue families caught off guard.

Gerri Neylon, a nurse in the radiation oncology department at Advocate Christ Medical Center, leads a team of volunteers on an annual Christmas season mission to bring holiday cheer to families impacted by cancer.

Neylon knows first hand the burden cancer inflicts on a family, but from it she helped start, from her own kitchen table, a venture that has mushroomed into something much bigger over the last several Christmas seasons.

“I’m proud that Christmas Without Cancer has spawned so much good from so much heartache,” said Neylon, after the visit to Natalie. “There is so much power in numbers and power in people coming together to help one another.”

Martello would agree.

“They’ve been fabulous. They really made our Christmas,” she said of the people behind the organizations. “They were very kind and welcoming and professional. They really helped us out.”