What happened, in summary

Gerri first noticed a slight cough that would not go away and a drop in stamina on the StairMaster. Before a planned hiking trip to Patagonia, she saw her doctor to check whether she was well enough for travel vaccinations. Her lungs sounded clear, but the doctor still ordered a chest X-ray, followed the next day by a CT scan. The scan was concerning enough that a pulmonologist cleared her schedule and performed a bronchoscopy. A week later, Gerri had a lung wedge resection. Two weeks after surgery, she learned she had Stage IV EGFR-positive non-small cell lung cancer. The diagnosis was shocking because she was an active tennis professional, hiker, kayaker, skier, wife, mother, and grandmother with no obvious risk factors. Gerri chose to keep living as fully as possible. She started targeted therapy, though the drug name is not reported, and 5 weeks later she hiked 90 miles in Patagonia. With support from her husband, oncologist, family, social worker, and lung cancer community, she continued hiking in places such as the Tetons, Utah national parks, New Zealand, and Iceland. Her story is best framed as living actively with Stage IV EGFR-positive lung cancer, not as remission or cure.