A deadly diagnosis almost derailed a mom's dream. Her husband gave her hope.

Maralee Lellio was surprised to be diagnosed with Stage II breast cancer at 29, but she knew what her next steps would be. Her disease was treatable. Her oncologist recommended chemotherapy and surgery. The treatment was unpleasant, but through it all, she focused on a future goal: welcoming a second child. Lellio dreamed of giving her firstborn daughter, then 2, a sibling. Lellio and her husband froze embryos before she began chemotherapy. She also underwent a double mastectomy. Once she finished treatment and was declared cancer-free in September 2019, the couple started IVF. Everything seemed to be falling into place. Then the headaches and dizziness started. Maralee Lellio and her daughter Ayla in 2019, while she recovers from a chemotherapy session. Maralee Lellio Lellio, now 30, told her oncologist about it. A CT scan didn't show anything abnormal. Lellio tried not to worry, thinking the pain might be a side effect of IDF medications. But the headaches intensified, and eventually became "incapacitating." In the summer of 2020, Lellio scheduled a telehealth appointment. The doctor she spoke to recommended she go to the emergency room. There, she received an MRI — and devastating news. "They came back into the room where I was, and said 'We found a very large brain tumor ... and there's no cure, sorry,'" Lellio recalled. "And just left us. That's how I found out I had terminal cancer. …