When Kasey found out she had cancer in 2006 she didn't know whether she was coming or going. She took leave from her job as an executive recruiter to undergo surgery and chemotherapy, but at the end of treatment her prognosis remained grim: Kasey was given two years to live. "I didn't have a future. I was told I was going to die," she says.

Kasey didn't know where to turn: she felt she had little to offer potential employers due to her prognosis and had the additional responsibility of caring for her 92-year-old mother.

After coming across an advertisement in a local paper, Kasey participated in a CWF-funded program that provides women with the support to start and grow their own businesses. "The first day I came home I thought 'I can take on the world and this is going to be the answer to all my prayers.'"

Today, Kasey has not only beaten the odds of her prognosis, she's launched her own interior design business, "All Things Home", which produces custom-sewn home décor products.

"The program has changed my life", says Kasey. "It has given me the skills I need to run my own business as well as the confidence to do it ... and one of the most important things I learned about myself is that I actually can do it. I have the inner strength to do it."