Of all the titles in Jennifer Marasco’s repertoire—Wife, Mother, Grandmother, Emergency Dispatcher, Quality Assurance Coordinator, and 3x Cancer Survivor—she’s most proud of a role she’s still developing as a self-proclaimed advocate.
Born and raised in Detroit, Michigan (USA), Marasco was content to stay in “Motor City” until early indicators of an economic recession took her family to San Diego, California (USA), for a new opportunity for her husband in August 2004. Though she had been working part time in the emergency room as a health coordinator/floater, she was ready to enter a new scene while keeping alight her desire to help others.
When a job posting came up to be an Emergency Dispatcher, Marasco naively entered a high skills test she hadn’t planned on and somehow aced the process anyway. Though the training was arduous, Marasco knew she had what it took.
“What drew me in was pushing through that point where you almost quit … because that’s when it gets easier,” she said. But quitting has never been her style.
For nearly 18 years, Marasco has worked at the North County Dispatch Joint Powers Authority (JPA) in California. Before becoming a full-time QA Coordinator in 2021, she devoted herself to keeping two part-time dispatching jobs (one at a neighboring center) for added flexibility while raising her four children.
Her professional path has always been a huge focus for Marasco, mainly because of her fulfillment from working in emergency services, but her health has forced her to focus on herself as well.
Marasco’s first personal encounter with the word “cancer” began with a sore throat and a strep test in 2002. The resident doctor on her hospital shift saw something more troubling than a virus and advised her to follow up on testing her thyroid.
“I put it off,” she said. “I was focused on filling in because the hospital was short-staffed, but the doctor kept reminding me to get it checked out.” A few tests later, what was considered “probably nothing” turned into papillary thyroid cancer, resulting in surgery to remove her thyroid and radiation treatment to kill any residual cancer cells.
In 2014, Marasco’s older sister was diagnosed with cancer for a second time, learning that she had an inherited harmful variant of the BRCA (BReast CAncer) gene that increased her risk of developing several cancers. She embarked on a long battle she sadly lost in 2018.
While contemplating her sister’s cancer journey, Marasco began to research what this meant for herself and her family’s shared hereditary traits. She found a comprehensive breast clinic and met with a geneticist who identified that she, too, was positive for the BRCA2 gene mutation, which exists in about 0.2-0.3% of the population.
Under the care of several physicians, Marasco began careful surveillance, which revealed a pre-cancerous lump she had removed from her breast in 2014 at age 46. Soon after, she had her ovaries removed to eliminate further potential risks.
“At that point in my dispatch career, I just thought ‘I can’t let down my crew,’” she said. “‘I don’t want to tell anyone what I’m dealing with.’”
Every six months following her preventative surgeries, Marasco had to be tested through either MRI or ultrasound and mammogram, each time fearing doctors would find something else. Managing her growing anxiety with her choice not to share her difficulties with the majority of her dispatch team was starting to eat away at her, but she wasn’t confident she’d be able to keep her job.
“I told myself ‘I’ve got this,’” she said. “But I was struggling inside. Twice, I went to the ER at the end of my shift because my heart was racing from the stress.”
In April 2016, Marasco received the dreaded news that doctors had diagnosed her with an early but fast-growing triple negative breast cancer, recommending an immediate mastectomy as her only treatment option.
“I asked if we could put off the surgery so I wouldn’t miss my son’s college tours,” she said. “I didn’t want to miss that for him; I didn’t want to focus on cancer.” Though her surgeon was concerned by Marasco’s desire to delay, her team agreed to schedule her surgery for the first week of September.
The mastectomy was successful, but the recovery was brutal. Due to an understaffing issue at the hospital, the covering nurse missed giving Marasco a pain pump, so she had nothing to combat the agony of her damaged nerves until the error was discovered.
Refusing to miss the milestone moments, Marasco attended her son’s football game in her post-op state and took a fall that affected her drain, possibly introducing infection. Four days later, her body went into sepsis.
“I had planned to go back to work in the middle of October, but I couldn’t do the job,” she said. “I was weak. I couldn’t walk. The sepsis attacked everything.” Still, fearing that she could lose her role as an Emergency Dispatcher and that cherished part of her identity, Marasco chose to keep her cancer a secret until new management took over her center shortly afterward in 2018.
“I went to therapy because I felt hopeless,” she said. “Even though I was putting my family first in my mind, I wasn’t putting myself and my health first. I didn’t know what I wanted.” Finding herself always bartering to shorten recovery times and fearful to take time off, Marasco started to gain wisdom in the healing of a burden shared.
“I was so afraid to show weakness,” she said. “But when I was diagnosed again with unrelated endometrial cancer in 2023, I started to see how the stress of being strong was breaking me down.” Marasco watched as other co-workers fought their own battles—in various forms—and started to share her journey with them, advocating for personal health and emotional wellness as a part of her newfound strength.
“I learned that we need to make space for ourselves,” she said. “I didn’t feel like I had time to take care of things, but then I realized I could have less time left in this life with that thinking.”
With her reformed perspective, Marasco tossed out the word “should” that was tugging her to bounce back like she had imagined others did. She learned to reach out to people in similar circumstances and talk about the feelings that make us all human.
Deeply grateful, Marasco was strengthened by the support of a few co-workers and friends who helped her in her recovery, encouraged by their sincere care.
“I experienced different mourning processes while my body was trying to heal,” Marasco said. “And I’m still learning to embrace that part of my journey, learning to care enough for myself to share that with others.”
After recovering from her hysterectomy a few months ago, Marasco caught herself falling into her old ways of asking the nurse if she could return to work early, but she was oddly delighted when the nurse flatly denied the request. “I realized, I need to give my body the energy it needs to heal,” she said.
In her role within Quality Assurance, Marasco has applied her experience as a patient to address the needs of the caller who may not know how to advocate for themselves. Without question, she’s found both purpose and passion as a voice for herself and all those who fight unseen battles.
