"When you're diagnosed, you’ve got a week to do a lot of stuff and you’re not gonna hear from your doctor. Number one: go freeze your eggs. I don’t care if you never wanted children. Number two: go shave your head. Go buy hats and wigs and do it NOW, while you feel good. Make a plan of who’s going to help you and where there are gaps. Who’s watching your kids? Have you spoken to your job yet? Consolidate your debt. There’s a lot to manage. In the course of a normal woman’s life, you’re managing a lot of things and you’re not going to be at the top of your game for a good year."Women have been told that they’re not supposed to take any downtime. You have to find a way to be vulnerable. I like to tell people you’re not totally human until you’re totally dependent on other human beings.""[My friends and my husband] make me able to function and I cannot imagine doing this alone. I am committed to people not having to do it alone. There are many, many moments every single day where it is so hard to just choose to stay alive. I cannot stress that enough — moment-to-moment, you’re like, 'I can’t do this, I am too sick, I have been too sick for too long, I have been too beaten down, I am too tired, and it would just be easier to let go.' What stops you is your people. That means different things to each person."For me, personally, I won't leave this Earth till I see the beginning of change. I won't see the end of change, but I need to see that beginning or my life meant nothing.""First of all, we need to raise research money and to actually develop a top-down cure; a cure for breast cancer that could then be applied to everyone who has breast cancer, not just the lower-staged people. There's really only one organization in this country [focused solely on metastatic research], it's called Metavivor and it's run by women with metastatic breast cancer."For every woman who's diagnosed with breast cancer, she needs someone from #Cancerland handy, or #Cancerland needs to be bigger, or other facilities need to adapt our approach."And [finally, we need a different kind of awareness.] True awareness leads to research, which leads to cure, which leads to life. People often believe, because of the pink ribbons, that breast cancer has been dealt with. They say, 'Didn’t we do that already?' It's about people knowing the realities and they’re not all pretty — [at least 100 people] die every day in this country from metastatic breast cancer. And they'll do it again tomorrow. And they’ve been doing it for 40 years without a change in that number. That tells us we’re not getting any closer to finding any form of cure."This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.