Anastasia Louise Cesario Killgore

June 3, 1980 to July 12, 2009

Anna’s Story

Anna was a dancer, musician, and honor student.  In 2003, she was?diagnosed with Stage IV ovraian cancer at the age of 23 while in law?school at the University of Oklahoma in Norman.  At first, the doctors?told her she had indigestion related to the stress of law school…. but?within weeks she developed a huge ascites and we knew this was more?serious than indigestion.  One month later the definitive diagnosis was?made and she underwent debulking surgery removing her ovaries, fallopian?tubes, omentum, spleen, a foot of her colon, a piece of her liver, and a?section of her diaphragm.

Just as Robin, the namesake of this website, experienced – Anna faced?ovarian cancer with optimism and the will to live.  Anna began endless,?continuous and different types of cancer treatments…. traveling from?Oklahoma City to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda MD?every other week for the last year and a half of her life to receive?Avastin (experimental at the time) in combination with several other?chemotherapeutic agents.  Anna’s determination and everlasting hope gave?her the strength to finish law school, practice law by providing legal?services to the indigent, become engaged, married, and bought a home.

Anna, too, did the “survivors” speech at the AMERICAN CANCER’S RELAY FOR?LIFE in Norman, OK just 6 weeks prior to her death at the age of 29.?Anna, like Robin, left a remarkable legacy bringing Ovarian Cancer to the?forefront of young women’s awareness .  In 2011, the PEGGY AND CHARLES?STEPHENSON CANCER CENTER AT THE UNIVERSITY OF OKLAHOMA opened with a?beautiful gynecologic-oncology waiting area named in Anna’s memory