Since her cancer relapsed, her friends and family have refused to let her feel sorry for herself.

“They will get me out of the house when I’m feeling down, or having negative thoughts,” she said. “I don’t know where I would be without the support of friends and family.”

In 2006, Valadez, a Magnolia native, was diagnosed with breast cancer, which has since advanced to Stage 4 and metastasized in her liver. She treated it as “aggressively as possible,” including surgery and rounds of both radiation and chemotherapy.

At left, Magnolia resident and single mom Amy Valadez helps others as the Montgomery County Youth Services Magnolia branch site supervisor while battling breast cancer.

She was in remission for three years until a routine blood test in May came up abnormal, and her doctors discovered the cancer had come back as Stage 4 on her liver.

Doctors told her that half of her liver was covered in tumors.

“I was floored when they told me it was on the liver and how much was there,” she said.

“It devastated all of us, we did not expect it.”

Valadez said the hardest part was telling her children the cancer came back.

“I would rather eat hot coals,” she said.

Valadez is the site supervisor for the Montgomery County Youth Services (MCYS) Magnolia branch, where she has worked for 12 years. In addition to the teen and family counseling MCYS does in its offices, she coordinates counseling teams that go into schools to talk with students after there’s been a death of a student or teacher.

Even though her job is helping others, Valadez says that the people around her are what keep her going.

“You keep fighting because of the people around you,” she said. “You don’t want to give them any pain, so you keep fighting with everything you have.”

Valadez is close with her 13-year-old daughter and three adult stepchildren from her previous marriage who she said stayed with her after her divorce from her ex-husband.

She has four grandchildren between the ages of 1 and 10, and her mother recently moved in with her to help out.

Valadez, who has a bachelor’s degree in psychology and a master’s degree in psychology and human development, is also a licensed chemical dependency counselor.

She became interested in counseling in college, where she started out wanting to be a lawyer, but was more interested in a psychology class she took her first semester.

Later on, she got an internship by accident at a teen alcohol and drug rehabilitation facility in Dallas and “absolutely loved it.”

Ever since then, she has been helping children and families through counseling and youth services at MCYS.

“I love it, it’s a wonderful agency and provides invaluable resources to the community,” she said.

She started her first round of chemotherapy at M.D. Anderson Medical Center in Houston recently, and said she plans to go in once a week for treatment, while still working full-time.

“Surgery is not an option,” she said.

She compares the cancer to a chronic illness, such as diabetes, where there is no cure, but it is controllable.

“My only option is to find the right chemo and get it under control,” she said. “I’ve been trying to do a lot of naturalistic, holistic and alternative treatments.”

Gail Walker, a close friend and neighbor of Valadez’s for the past 12 years, came up with the idea to organize a fundraiser for Valadez to help pay for medical treatment and establish a college fund for her 13-year-old daughter, Cameron.

“I was lying awake one night at 3 a.m. and it just came to me,” Walker said.

The fundraiser, titled “Amy Cameron-Valadez FUNdraiser,” is scheduled for July 31 at the West Montgomery County Community Development Center, where Valadez works.

The event will feature live and silent auctions, a dunking booth, balloon pop, cake walk and other activities for children.

“My hope for the future is that God gives me the opportunity to continue raising my kids, and I want to watch my daughter graduate and get married,” Valadez said. “That’s the prayer I have every night.”

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