Janet is a recent college graduate from UCLA who has earned a bachelor’s degree in International Development Studies with a minor in Education.

Janet was born in Honolulu, Hawaii on January 6. She is the 23-year old daughter of immigrant parents from China. Her family moved to California when she was 11, and she now splits her time living in the Bay Area and Los Angeles. She has a younger brother as well who is a junior in college.

Janet doesn’t know how to describe herself except as an ESFJ, four letters from the Myer-Briggs Test. Her passions and areas of interest include: nonprofit management/consulting, social corporate responsibility, educational policy, teaching, literacy, environmental sustainability, and wildlife conservation.

On August 24, 2009 she received a diagnosis for acute lymphoblastic leukemia. It is a rapidly progressing form of leukemia containing large numbers of malignant, immature white blood cells (called lymphoblasts) that crowd out the normal cells in the bone marrow and can spread to other organs of the human body.

She created this memoir and blog as a personal link to keep her friends and family updated as she undergoes an intensive battle against this life-threatening disease. In addition, she simultaneously established the grassroots movement, Helping Janet (www.helpingjanet.com), with the assistance of a wonderful support network to increase the number of ethnic minorities in the National Marrow Donor Registry to offer life-saving matches for over 6000 patients. She dedicates this movement in memory of Michelle Maykin and her own grassroots movement, Project Michelle (www.projectmichelle.com), founded a few years ago.

But she has big plans after this battle — including becoming a full-time teacher laboring over educational disparities, working to strengthen social ventures and non-profits, and traveling the world someday. This is her life and story. There is no doubt that she will become a life-long advocate of marrow/stem cell transplants offered to as many individuals as possible who need it to reclaim their lives and fulfill their own personal destinies.