Cancer-stricken parents of two young children need help in their battle

Katrina and Mark Bennett are enjoying every minute they can with their beloved 19-month-old son Wesley, and 6-month-old daughter Parkyr.

The couple is coming to terms with devastating news.

The young parents have been diagnosed with cancer.

Mark and Katrina were high school friends, they lost touch and reconnected years later.

In the past two years they’ve gotten married and had their kids.

Everything was fine, but this past summer, Mark began feeling awful and went to his doctor. He was diagnosed with colon cancer.

Days later, Katrina felt strangled. She went for emergency testing and doctors found she had lymphoma in her chest.

“It’s not very good, but if you have to have cancer, it is the one that you cross fingers and hope for,” says Katrina. “Based on that, I feel lucky.”

While both 34-year-olds put on a brave face and battle cancer, their real concern is their children, and how they’ll survive up to 10 months of chemotherapy and radiation.

To top it off, the couple is facing financial difficulties. Both are off work and funds are running low.

“Every once in a while you think – are we going to lose our house? Do we have to move back with our parents? Should we sell our car?”

Family and friends have rallied around the couple, especially when both of them were in different hospitals undergoing treatment at the same time.

But in this family, hope prevails.

Loved ones are organizing a fundraiser and a trust account has been set up.

“At the end of the day, when it’s all said and done and we’re all doing really well, we’ll look back on this and have great stories,” says Darlene McAllister, Mark’s mom.

A fundraiser has been organized to help the family. It will take place at John B. Pub in Coquitlam on November 7 at 6 p.m.

If you would like to help the family, a Bennett family trust account has been set up at Coast Capital Savings.