Teen Most cancers Survivor Weeks Away from Marine Corps Bootcamp (Unique)

Ever since she was a younger lady, Britney Moyeda had her sights set on becoming a member of the Marine Corps. Now, years after surviving most cancers, she’s simply weeks away from beginning bootcamp.

“I’m very excited,” Moyeda, now 18, tells PEOPLE. “It’s one thing to be pleased with – as a result of I can truly show to different youngsters that had most cancers that they’ll do no matter they need in life and nothing can cease them.”

When Moyeda was in 5^th grade, she noticed a classmate’s father at commencement in his Marine Corps uniform. “I believed that was actually cool,” she says. She determined then that she ultimately needed to enlist.

However a yr later, when she was 12, Moyeda obtained sick.

She remembers taking a nap after faculty, and when she wakened, she couldn’t stand. “I fell,” she says. “Half of my physique wasn’t working.”

She was identified with acute lymphoblastic leukemia on Might 25, 2018.

“After they first instructed me I had most cancers, I cried. After which I instructed my mother every thing was gong to be tremendous,” she says. “I knew it was going to be tremendous – I simply felt it. I wasn’t scared.”

Britney went by 15 cycles of chemotherapy and 11 completely different medicines, and a number of blood transfusions. After years of remedy, she rang the bell being declared cancer-free at Texas Kids’s Hospital on September 7, 2020.

She was additionally nonetheless decided to grow to be a Marine.

“I believe that is actually nice, that she’s been by every thing that she’s been by along with her most cancers remedy and has been in a position to make it by that and concentrate on a long-term objective like becoming a member of the Marines and serving our nation,” says Dr. Tim Porea, Texas Kids’s Hospital pediatric oncologist and retired U.S. Navy Captain.

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However first, Texas Kids’s needed to ship her medical data to recruiters.

“You need to have seen, it was like a thick e book of paperwork that I needed to disclose to the Marines. It was like 1,000, virtually 2,000 pages of paperwork for my most cancers remedies,” says Moyeda.

When it got here time to attend bodily coaching classes, Moyeda confirmed up and did extra — and labored more durable — than the others.

“In the event that they wanted one thing I’d routinely go get no matter they wanted as quick as I might,” she says. “I put in further effort they usually noticed the hassle that I needed to affix.”

In the end, she shares that recruiters, her sergeant and her gunny sergeant labored to assist her meet her dream. “They didn’t cease till they obtained me to it,” she provides.

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Nonetheless, as she ready to graduate from Angleton Excessive College on Might 24, 2024, Moyeda made certain she had some choices “simply in case I didn’t make it into the Marine Corps.”

As a back-up plan, the teenager — who can also be part of Texas Kids’s Most cancers and Hematology Heart’s Lengthy-Time period Survivor Program — earned certificates in welding, floral design, culinary arts and earned a CNA certificates.

Luckily, after spending the summer season in Mexico visiting household, Moyeda is ready to go away for bootcamp on Aug. 26.

“I’m just a little scared, I’m just a little excited,” Moyeda tells PEOPLE. “I’m just a little little bit of every thing.”

However most significantly, she’s able to face no matter life has in retailer for her — and he or she desires different youngsters who’ve gone by most cancers to really feel the identical. She says, “Life doesn’t finish after they inform you, ‘You’ve got most cancers,’ it retains on going.”