Highlight: Jesse Crews

I want to start off by saying, these photos are back from 2018 and most of the text in this blog will be from then. These photos are painful and beautiful. If you have any avoidance towards sad subjects or cancer - this is your warning. Now onto the story.

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“I was recently honored with the opportunity to document the painful, deeply saddening, yet beautiful timeline that is cancer during pregnancy. With her permission, this is Jesse Crews and this is her story.

Jesse Crews, being asked if she would be having a boy or a girl, sitting in her living room that she was renovating at the time.

I must admit, I am almost hesitant to write this - it feels wrong looking on the outside in, and telling you of her condition. First off, let me ease your mind; the baby is healthy and her cancer was caught early thanks to screenings for the pregnancy. But what lies in the aftermath? Jesse has a genetically mutated BRCA1 gene, a human gene that produces tumor suppressor proteins.

This gene in particular is very important, as it ensures the stability of each cell’s genetic material by repairing DNA. Speaking specifically, this mutated gene increases the risk of breast and ovarian cancers exponentially. To put it into perspective, roughly 12% of women will develop breast cancer sometime during their lives. While in comparison, 72% of women who inherit the mutated gene will develop breast cancer sometime during their lives. Past that, the mutated BRCA1 gene can be inherited from both a mother and father. And each child of a parent with this mutated gene has a 50% chance of inheriting it. Luckily in this case, men with this gene are less likely to develop cancer.

For Jesse, her son will join the family early, but not underdeveloped. She’ll then undergo further screenings, prophylactic surgery, and chemo-prevention. Without those surgeries, the likelihood of cancer returning is very high. As for her and her husband’s previously envisioned future, where their sons would have several other siblings, has been swiped away to reveal a future with two children. For after these surgeries, she will no longer be able to conceive.

But what is left is nothing short of a miracle. One brother, having a younger brother to look out for and one younger brother having an intrinsically curious older brother to look up to in their family home. While they will likely bump heads, there are very few bonds greater than that. While they may not see it early on, there is no greater love than that in name. And what is left in the fury of sadness, is beauty - and what is left over this burned land is a flower...waiting to bloom.

-Owen Kingsley Lane”

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This shoot turned out to be one of the most important things in my life and is what really made me want to pursue photography. I have no false, grandiose idea of what this shoot could mean to anyone - but it did make Jesse happy at the time and she cried when I showed them to her. That’s the feeling I chase all the time and it seldomly shows up, but when it does - I think of her and this shoot. Jesse passed away on July 9th, 2019. If you’d like to donate to cancer research, follow the link provided here. Thank you.