Former Palmetto Bay Mayor Shelley Stanczyk‘s daughter is critically ill and awaiting a liver transplant in Wisconsin.
Sarah Stanczyk, 32, a Coral Reef High grad (class of 2001) and University of Miami grad (B.A.) was going for her PhD at NSU, where she got her master’s in international security, when she fell ill. She is now in complete liver failure and was transferred to the University of Wisconsin Hospital in Madison from a hospital in St. Louis, MO, Friday night to be evaluated by the UW liver transplant team.
Her condition has also caused partial kidney failure, for which she requires dialysis, but she is too sick for a living donor transplant — which is only a portion of the iver — and is awaiting a traditional liver to become available.
Mayor Stanczyk and her husband Stanley Stanczyk are at her bedside and have asked for prayers as they hold out hope for a miracle.
“She can answer questions and knows that we’re here and knows what is going on,” Stanczyk told Ladra Sunday morning. “Her sisters call her on the phone and talk to her and tell her they love her an tell her to get well and be strong.”
Stanczyk has been by her daughter’s side since she fell ill in May. Last week, her condition took a turn for the worse and she was moved to the intensive care unit. “We were lucky that we were able to fly her out and she is stable,” her mother said. “She’s intubated and has a feeding tube but those are supportive measures. They are cutting back on it as she becomes more and more stable.
“She was much more alert in bed when sisters and dad came to visit. She has confusion when they are no longer there,” Stanczyk said, her voice cracking. “I had fears that this was it, so I had rounded up everybody to come and visit her. For two days, people came in from out of town and she was awake and alert and she was with the program. She was really good and she has since regressed.”
That’s why her mom wants all of Sarah’s friends to send her e-cards through the hospital website.
“You can pick a picture and write a little note and it gets delivered to the patient. She got a couple 100 of them and they make a difference,” Stanczyk said.
Stanczyk also thanked U.S. Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Florida) and Sen. Joseph Keveany (D-Missouri), who helped secure and expedite the transfer.
Want to help? The family has set up a GoFundMe page to offset mounting expenses
Sarah was in the dance program at Coral Reef, where she was also captain of the cheerleading team. Fellow students remember her as the girl who befriended all the new kids and talked to all the unpopular kids. Even students she knew at Perrine Elementary have sent her cards.
Sarah Stanczyk is the widow of an Iraq War Army veteran who passed away unexpectedly in 2008. She fell in love again and lost her fiancé in 2009 in a helicopter crash in Afghanistan.
The family has started a GoFundMe account to help pay the mounting expenses and her sister, Katie Gonzalez, has posted several updates on her condition there.
“It’s important because it’s going to leave her with a lot of debt,” Mayor Stanczyk said. “People have been so generous. And I think Sarah is someone who really is deserving.”
The funds will also help with the medications. One prescription cost $1,800. When the insurance refused to pay for it, the family cut the course in half and had to pay almost $1,000.
Almost $13,000 had been raised by noon Sunday from 174 donors in nine days, including $100 from Pinecrest Mayor Cindy Lerner and $1,000 from State Rep. Michael Bileca.
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