Community Corner

A West Hartford Mom Fights Cancer with Indomitable Spirit

Kim Green has been living with stage 4 breast cancer for 15 years yet summons energy to help others.

About this sponsorship: In honor of the 60th anniversary of Sir Edmund Hillary’s historic ascent of Mount Everest, Patch and Grape-Nuts are teaming up to highlight those who inspire people around them to climb their own mountains.

By Lisa Lenkiewicz

Kim Green may have a personal battle with cancer, but it is one she has been winning.

For the past 15 years, she has been living with Stage 4 metastatic breast cancer. Despite this, the West Hartford, Connecticut wife and mother has faced her struggle with bravery and an indomitable spirit.

Diagnosed with Stage 2 breast cancer at age 34 while pregnant with her second child, Green underwent a bilateral mastectomy and chemotherapy treatments. Looking for support, in 2001, she was introduced to the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure and began training for the group’s annual 5K race. After that achievement, she ran her first marathon at the Walt Disney World Marathon.

But then the cancer spread to her lymph nodes and neck. Even though she was ill, she accepted the challenge to chair the 2005 Race for the Cure in Hartford, which she recalled as one of her and her family’s “finest moments.”

Next in her journey came a life-changing experience when neighbors threw a party to raise funds to send her to Lourdes, France, where she spent a week partaking in the healing baths.

When she returned, she had a deep desire to learn more about her Catholic faith, which led her to become a Eucharistic minister. She completed studies at the Catholic Biblical College at St. Thomas Seminary and became a lay minister. She now ministers to the homebound, through a ministry called HEAL (Health, Encouragement And Love) she founded at her church, St. Peter Claver.

For years, Green’s goal has been to live long enough to see her kids leave the nest. This fall, her daughter will head to college and her son is finishing his freshman year of high school.

With the support of family, friends and the doctors and nurses at Saint Francis Hospital, “I am seeing my goal fulfilled,” said Green, now 48.

She has had a few setbacks of late, including complications that resulted in open-heart surgery and most recently, a 22-day hospital stay due to loss of feeling in her left hand.

But the resilient mom soldiers on: “There’s something I try to remember when things are bad: ‘Let your mess be your message.’ I’ve been given the advantage of a tremendous faith that carries me. To help others, if I can, just shows that cancer hasn’t beaten me.

“Success in reaching my goal is every morning when I wake up and put my feet on the floor to start a new day.”  


We’re dedicating the months of April and May to telling the stories of people locally and statewide who have overcome the impossible, affecting positive change in their own lives, or in communities. Sponsored by Grape-Nuts.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here