Cancer survivor story: Sheryl Rodgers

Sheryl Rodgers – a Jacksonville, FL Local 122 member and breast cancer survivor – turned her battle with aggressive cancer into a mission to raise awareness and improve fire fighter health and safety, dedicating her life to preventing others from suffering the same fate.

January 14 • 2025

In 2013, after 16 years of service with the Jacksonville Fire Rescue Department and just three days after my 38th birthday, I was diagnosed with Stage 2 triple negative right breast cancer.  

The doctors told me this was the rarest, fastest-growing, and most aggressive form of breast cancer with the highest chance of recurrence (80% within five years). At the time of my diagnosis, I had two young children (ages 12 and 13), had just married my second husband four months prior, and we had just started remodeling our newly purchased home.  

So, I went to work fighting this disease with everything I had.  

Over the next six months, I underwent 16 rounds of aggressive chemotherapy. I immediately lost my hair. The chemotherapy was tough, and most days I felt as if I’d been run over and left for dead.  

I finished the year off by undergoing a double mastectomy with reconstruction. It was an intensive surgery, and I would spend several days in ICU and undergo two blood transfusions.  

During my battle, I had many of my brother and sister fire fighters volunteer to work my shifts. A group of them organized a raffle to help me financially. The outpouring of support from the “firehood” was incredible. 

I recall that immediately following my diagnosis, I was sent to a geneticist because the doctors seemed baffled as to why a 38-year-old with no family history of breast cancer who had also tested negative for the BRCA gene would develop this rarest and most aggressive form of breast cancer. Unfortunately, because I had already watched several of my brother fire fighters succumb to cancer, I was pretty certain that I knew the answer.  

To this day, the geneticists have been unable to identify any genetic marker or predisposition for my cancer. 

I was fortunate and blessed to have survived my cancer. I know that I’m one of the lucky ones. Since then, I have made it my life’s mission to learn all I can about fire fighters’ exposures and risks for cancer, and I do all I can to educate others about those risks.  

So, I went to work fighting this disease with everything I had.

Sheryl rodgers

I have also worked very hard to help my department improve the health and safety of our own members. I have served as the coordinator of our department’s FACE (Firefighters Attacking the Cancer Epidemic) Team, attended numerous fire fighter health and safety conferences, taught fire fighter cancer awareness and prevention classes to fire fighter recruits and company officers within my department as well as several surrounding departments in my area, spoken on my local NPR radio station, and even been featured in a documentary to share my story and educate others on the increased risk of cancers that firefighters face. Recently, I have also begun to mentor other fire fighters who have been diagnosed with cancer. 

I have often wondered, “Why me?” At first, this question was more lamenting, but over time it progressed to more of a sense of purpose. Why did I get cancer? Why was I lucky enough to be one of those who survived? I have to believe that everything happens for a reason. I have to believe that there was a purpose for what I (and my family) went through.  

My hope is that my efforts since my own cancer battle will have prevented even just one more fire fighter from dealing with this horrible disease and perhaps lead to a cultural shift that makes our job safer for the future generation of firefighters.  

If that is the outcome, then – for me – it will all have been worth it. I’ve watched far too many of my brothers and sisters battle cancer or succumb to cancer. Enough is enough. This must change! 

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These IAFF member survivor stories were collected by the Firefighter Cancer Support Network for Fire Fighter Cancer Awareness Month in January.