A Hillsboro woman with metastatic breast cancer turns her camera lens on others and herself in transformative portrait sessions.
HILLSBORO, Ore. — On a beautiful fall day, colorful falling leaves fill a Hillsboro neighborhood. There is beauty inside this home, too.
There, a family plays a card game, as they love to do: Danyel and Mike, and grown daughter Breanna, who comes to visit more often these days.
“We wanted to do something for the holidays that’s a tradition, so we started this, and it’s quite the battle,” said Danyel Rogers.
The beauty at this table is about love and support, facing life and death. Danyel’s journey with breast cancer began in 2022.
“They found the tumor. It was triple-negative, which means they don’t know what feeds it; they don’t know what’s causing it to grow,” explained Danyel.
She aggressively took on the tumor: a double mastectomy, and Danyel said no to reconstructive surgery. Many difficult treatments beat back the cancer and gave Danyel a new lease on life.
“This is really important, these times, where we’re just sitting together and making memories,” said Danyel.
“It’s like we’ve been relying on each other for so many years, so many decades. We do everything together, and there’s no way I would not be here for her,” said Mike.
“I have my job and chaos and everything going on, but it’s really important to make those times as much as I can,” added Breanna.
Danyel just ended her work as an accountant, but she continues her other work in photography. It used to be pets and families.
But with Danyel’s cancer diagnosis came inspiration. Her studio, now filled with costumes and props — and lots of makeup — became a place of transformation for breast cancer survivors into warrior women. The results are stunning.
“I don’t create the strength, don’t create the beauty. I showcase it, so it’s already there,” explained Danyel.
PHOTOS: Portrait sessions empower women with breast cancer as warriors
“I’ve known Danyel for a couple of years now. Our diagnoses were just a couple of months apart,” said Wendy Murray.
Murray and Kari Vandenberg have been to the studio before, and they’re back for more.
For Wendy, a double mastectomy and no reconstruction; she’s proud of her flat chest. And she’s grateful to a dear friend.
“I feel good to be around Danyel. Every time I’m around Danyel, I feel at peace and that she offers this experience for women. I love you,” Wendy told her friend.
Danyel simply responded, “I love you, too.”
It’s as much about the process as the images that come from it.
Danyel Rogers has captured the warrior in hundreds of women — each one unique and inspirational.
“As soon as I created this project, I knew that I had something here, for these women and myself. The more I got into it, the more passionate I got about it, the more I knew this was going to work, the more I knew this was going to benefit the community,” said Danyel.
That community includes Danyel and her family.
So, she turned the camera on herself, and Mike helped her see her warrior within. The pictures are displayed on the wall above the table in their home. More important now than ever.
Danyel got a clean bill of health early this year.
“But August came, that 6-month scan came. Mike was with me, and you know…”
Followed by the news in August: “Basically saying that there were tumors all over my lungs, and I was officially metastatic at that point. There were at least seven tumors that they could count… I learned I’m dying,” explained Danyel.
The cancer came back, and it spread quickly.
“Yeah, it’s rough when you start thinking like you planned a life together, and then somebody comes by and says we’re going to take the end date from here and move it to here,” said husband Mike, motioning with his hands, bringing them close together.
“I was so confident she was going to be done with it, and then for it to come back, I was like, this isn’t what I had in my head. This isn’t at all what I planned,” said daughter Breanna.
Nobody planned for this. But here they are.
“So ultimately, I’ll stay on the chemo path until it stops working,” said Danyel.
Back in the studio, the reality comes through the filters and effects.
“I’m not the exception. We’re all going to die, but some of us are going to die sooner, and we don’t have control over that. So, when I get to come out here with Danyel who — just keeping it real — is going to die sooner,” said Wendy, with tears, her voice trailing off.
The studio provides a safe escape and a healing empowerment, including for those still in the midst of their fight, like Kari, who recounted how she first heard her prognosis.
“She sat me and my husband down and said, ‘We can give you a few good years,’ and I’m going from healthy to ‘you’re dying.’ It was really scary, like, having a little kid, is he going to remember who I am?” Kari shared.
Kari is a 37-year-old nurse, a wife and a mother of two. Her prognosis is potentially better than it was to start, but she faces many unknowns.
“I was given something really difficult, and I don’t know who I am through all of this. And to be told you are strong, you are whole, you are beautiful, you’re a warrior — that’s really powerful. We all go through breast cancer, and not all of us feel like a warrior coming out of it, but it is possible if you get into that right mindset. And every person that goes through this, no matter what the outcome, they are a warrior,” said Kari through her tears.
The power of what happens in the portrait studio in Hillsboro will go on as long as Danyel does.
“Something about these warrior sessions — it’s my legacy. And now, with the metastatic diagnosis, it’s totally my bullseye right now, just watching and trying to get as many women in here to have this experience because the more I can do, the more legacy I leave behind,” said Danyel.
