Missouri Mom Delayed Cancer Treatment To Save Her Future Daughter

St. Louis mother Cara Combs, 38, found out she had stage IV melanoma 25 weeks into the pregnancy with her fourth child. Knowing that the treatment to kill the cancer could harm her unborn baby, Combs chose to postpone help for her future daughter-even against the wishes of her oncologist.

"There's no good decision here," she wrote, according to Combs' Facebook page, regarding her decision. "We will both be fighting for our live and I feel incredibly guilty about that."

On Tuesday morning, she died just three days after giving birth to Shaylin Combs on Dec. 5, weighing in at 2 pounds, 1.2 ounces at birth according to Fox News.

Complications from the cancer spread to her liver, according to health officials via KSL.com, and the delivery had made it impossible for her to recover.

"She sacrificed everything so her legacy could live on," Ray Combs, her husband, wrote of his wife on the family's GoFundMe page.

So far, the family has raised over $50,000 of their $100,000 goal for future family expenses. 

Stage IV melanomas are very hard to cure as they have already spread to the lymph nodes and other areas of the body, according to the American Cancer Society.While skin tumors or enlarged lymph nodes can sometimes be removed by surgery or treated with radiation therapy, metastases in internal organs are more difficult to treat.

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