In Honor of Kaye: Three Sisters Turning Loss into Hope

This November, during Pancreatic Cancer Awareness Month, PanCAN invites you to join our movement to turn science into survival. Through All Together We Can, our five-year, $250 million campaign, we are investing in breakthrough research, expanding patient support and advocating to accelerate progress and help more people survive pancreatic cancer. In this blog post, get to know Chancy, Jena and Keiley, daughters of Kaye Monfort, who passed away from pancreatic cancer

For Chancy, Jena and Keiley, their mother, Kaye, was many things - brilliant, generous, a devoted grandmother and, above all, the center of their world.

"Every day feels dimmer without her," says Keiley.

Kaye passed away from pancreatic cancer after a devastating four-month journey. The speed of the disease left little time to process what was happening, let alone imagine life without her. But amid their grief, the three sisters found a way to honor their mother's life by carrying forward something she had always believed in - the power of giving back.

Today, through their involvement with PanCAN, participation in PanCAN PurpleStride and continued support for research, Chancy, Jena and Keiley are turning their loss into a commitment to a future where other families have more time, more options and more hope.

Finding Community in the Hardest Moments

Before Kaye's diagnosis, the sisters knew pancreatic cancer was serious, but they had little firsthand understanding of the disease. Unlike cancers that receive more public attention, pancreatic cancer felt unfamiliar - and isolating.

"When we heard the results that it was pancreatic, I think most, if not all of us felt a significant loss of hope," Chancy recalls.

The family faced an overwhelming reality, with doctors estimating Kaye had anywhere from three months to two years. For the sisters, the uncertainty was difficult not only to comprehend but to navigate alongside their mother.

Then came PurpleStride.

The family formed Team KCM in Kaye's honor and found a community that understood - something they desperately needed.

"PurpleStride was able to give us something positive, hopeful and meaningful to work toward and look forward to during such a difficult time," says Keiley. "It offered us even the slightest feeling of control during such a dizzying four months."

For Jena, participating in PurpleStride helped the family feel less alone. It also brought an outpouring of support from friends and loved ones who wanted to stand beside them.

Chancy experienced something similar when she shared her personal fundraising link with colleagues and friends. Many responded not only to support her family but to share their own experiences of losing a parent or grandparent to pancreatic cancer.

"It was almost as if these stories had been living in the shadows," she says.

Those connections offered comfort and revealed how many families had been touched by the disease. They also reinforced why raising awareness, supporting patients and families, and investing in research matter so much.

A Legacy of Giving Back

Philanthropy was woven into the sisters' lives long before pancreatic cancer became personal. Kaye devoted herself to charitable causes, including the Cattle Baron's Ball and leadership of the Monfort Family Foundation, which focuses on the family's home community, higher education and healthcare.

Her example shaped how her daughters understand their responsibility to others.

"Watching my mom dedicate so much of her time and effort to philanthropy throughout my entire life was really inspiring," says Keiley. "It very much so cemented in me the understanding that giving back is not necessarily even a choice but a responsibility."

Jena remembers growing up with the understanding that their family's blessings came with an opportunity - and an obligation - to help others. Chancy carries forward her mother's belief that focused, intentional giving can make a meaningful difference.

That commitment now includes pancreatic cancer research and patient support. The sisters are contributing in their own ways, from participating in PurpleStride to helping raise awareness of a disease that remains unfamiliar to many.

For Jena, the hope is that something good can emerge from her mother's passing. She wants other families to know about pancreatic cancer and for patients to have access to the care and resources they need.

Her sisters share that vision. They know financial support can help advance research, but so can telling their story, educating others and bringing more people into the fight.

All Together, We Can Change What Comes Next

For the sisters, PanCAN's All Together We Can campaign represents a future they wish their mother could have experienced - one with earlier detection, more effective treatments and better outcomes for patients.

Since Kaye's passing, Chancy has watched promising advances in targeted KRAS/RAS inhibitors and personalized mRNA vaccines emerge, offering encouragement that progress is possible. But the sisters know there is still a lot of work to do.

They hope that one day, a pancreatic cancer diagnosis will no longer feel like an inevitable death sentence.

"I hope people will not hear those words and instantly think 'death sentence,'" says Jena. "My hope is that they will hear those words and think this is a 'good' cancer and can easily be beat."

For Keiley, the urgency is deeply personal. The campaign's mission reflects everything her family hopes for other patients and loved ones who might otherwise face the same devastating experience.

And Kaye herself had a glimpse of that future. Not long before she passed away, she told Keiley that she found comfort in knowing her family would continue supporting pancreatic cancer research in her name.

"I think it gave her peace to know that, through those efforts, her death might feel a little less meaningless and not entirely in vain," says Keiley.
The sisters believe their mother would be proud to see their family united in this cause - not simply remembering her, but putting her values into action.

Her legacy lives on in every step taken at PurpleStride, every conversation that raises awareness, every gift that advances research and every effort to help another family find hope.

Chancy, Jena and Keiley are honoring their mother by working toward a future in which pancreatic cancer no longer takes so much, so quickly - and in which more families have the chance to make memories that last a lifetime.

They know that together, we can make survival the expectation, not the exception.