INDY Foundation: Connecting through Cancer

INDY Foundation
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Welcome to the INDY Foundation: Connecting Through Cancer hosted by Kayla Keenan, founder of INDY Foundation, a non-profit located in central Minnesota. Here at INDY, we believe in supporting and connecting cancer warriors throughout their cancer journey. Our mission is to provide financial and community support to cancer warriors across Minnesota. Join us as we share inspiring stories, valuable resources and important updates to help you and your load ones navigate the challenges of cancer with strength and hope. Each episode will feature heartfelt conversations with cancer warriors, their families, and experts in the field, offering insights and encouragement for every step of the way. INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  1. 3d ago

    What I'd Tell Myself Nine Years Into Grief

    In this episode of the Connecting Through Cancer podcast from INDY Foundation, Kayla reflects on the approaching nine-year heaven anniversary of Kyle’s passing, honoring their final days together and describing how grief can feel heavy and suffocating. Speaking to listeners who feel their story has ended, the host shares what they would tell their past self: grief was never meant to be carried forever, and surviving is not synonymous with healing. They discuss learning to “let go” not by forgetting or relinquishing love, but by releasing the weight that keeps someone stuck, noting that healing can deepen appreciation for what was shared. The host recalls hospice-room conversations filled with tears and laughter about dreams, love, and a future without Kyle, and encourages hope, faith, and community dialogue about finding joy again. 00:00 Welcome Back 00:05 Kyle’s Anniversary 00:43 When Loss Hits 01:19 A Message to Past Me 01:54 Surviving vs Healing 02:21 Learning to Let Go 02:54 Hospice Room Memories 03:41 Hope After Grief 04:18 Make Space for Hope 04:48 Join the Conversation 05:01 Share and Support INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  2. Jul 14

    What Would Your Loved One Say About You in Heaven?

    Takeaways A single quote scrolled past on Instagram can completely reframe how you think about grief, legacy, and the story you're currently living.Grief's questions change over time. What starts as "why did this happen" can eventually become "what story am I living right now."You still get to choose the story your loved ones would tell about you today. That story isn't finished.Summary of the episode As Kyle's nine-year heaven anniversary approaches, Kayla shares what happened when a quote stopped her mid-scroll on Instagram: "What if every time you thought of them, it was because they were telling a story about you in heaven?" That single line became the seed for this episode, a reflection on nine years of telling Kyle's story and what it might mean to ask, for once, what story he would tell about her. Kayla walks through how her relationship with grief has changed since Kyle's cancer journey and death. In the early years, the questions were "why me," "why Kyle," "why did he have to get cancer." Over time, those questions shifted into something different: not a search for a reason, but a search for the story she's currently living, and whether it's one worth telling. She talks honestly about the fork in the road after devastating loss, the pull toward addiction or numbing out, and the deliberate choice she made instead to build the INDY Foundation and turn her family's cancer journey into something that helps others. She's clear that grief and resilience aren't opposites. Both can be true at the same time. The episode closes with a direct challenge to the listener: think about the people in your life who have passed. What story would they tell about you today? Not someday. Today. Because the story isn't over yet, and there's still time to write it the way you want it told. Key Topics Covered: Grief on a heaven anniversary and how anticipatory grief shows up in the weeks beforeHow the questions grief asks change over years, from "why me" to "what story am I living"Choosing resilience over addiction or numbing out after devastating lossThe origin of the INDY Foundation, born out of Kyle's cancer journeyA direct challenge to reflect on what your own loved ones in heaven might say about you todayINDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  3. Jul 7

    What Cancer Taught Me About Titles (And Why They Don't Matter)

    Takeaways Cancer is the great equalizer. It strips away titles, careers, and status, and leaves only presence.The people patients and caregivers remember aren't the most credentialed ones in the room. They're the ones who simply showed up.Influence doesn't require authority. Every person, regardless of title, has the power to make someone feel seen.In this solo episode of Connecting Through Cancer, host Kayla Keenan steps back from the hospital room and into something she's been sitting with in her own life: how quickly titles stop mattering once cancer enters the picture. Kayla hasn't gone through cancer herself, but she has watched a spouse fight it, and that experience reshaped how she sees status, career, and what actually makes someone feel loved. Kayla walks through what she calls cancer's "leveling" effect. In an infusion chair, a hospital room, or beside someone you love, nobody cares about your job title, your LinkedIn profile, or what's printed on your business card. What people remember instead is who showed up. The nurse who remembered a patient's favorite blanket. The receptionist who greeted her by name every time. The neighbor who quietly mowed the lawn. The friend who dropped off dinner without asking a single question. She reflects on influence, too, and pushes back on the idea that it requires a platform or a leadership title. Influence, in Kayla's words, requires humanity, not authority. Every listener, no matter their job or position, has the ability to leave someone better than they found them. The episode closes with a challenge: instead of asking what title you want next, ask how you make the people around you feel. Encouraged. Loved. Hopeful. Like they matter. That, Kayla says, is a legacy worth building, and it doesn't require a promotion. INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  4. Jun 30

    What a Hospital Window on the 4th of July Taught Me About Love

    Takeaways Cancer doesn't care about the calendar. Holidays don't pause treatment schedules, lab work, or the impossible decisions families are making every single day.Two realities can exist at the same time. Someone is watching fireworks. Someone is watching a heart monitor. Neither reality is wrong — but they are worlds apart, and the people inside the hospital deserve to be seen.Hope doesn't depend on your location. It isn't confined to a celebration. Hope can sit quietly beside a hospital bed. Hope can be found in the squeeze of a hand.Summary of the Episode In this episode of Connecting Through Cancer, Kayla Keenan reflects on what it means to celebrate the 4th of July when someone you love is fighting for their life — and what it felt like to stand beside that person, watching fireworks through a hospital window, while the rest of the world celebrated outside. Roughly ten years ago, Kayla sat on a couch next to a window overlooking the Mississippi River. Outside, families were on the riverbank, kids were running, boats were going by. Her phone was lighting up with photos and Snapchat stories and burgers on the grill. And she was exactly where she wanted to be — beside someone she loved, watching life happen through a pane of glass, while that person fought for theirs. That day changed her. Not because she wanted to be somewhere else, but because she realized something she has carried ever since: cancer doesn't pause for holidays. It doesn't care if it's Christmas morning, your anniversary, your child's birthday, or the Fourth of July. Treatment continues. Lab work continues. Pain continues. And families continue making impossible decisions while the rest of the world lights up the sky. In this reflective, deeply personal episode, Kayla explores how cancer redefines the meaning of freedom — not the fireworks-and-barbecue kind, but the kind that looks like clear scans, going home, sitting at your own kitchen table, and one more ordinary day with the people you love. She offers a message for every caregiver, patient, and family member spending this Fourth of July inside a hospital: you are not forgotten, and hope does not depend on your location. This episode is a gentle invitation to the rest of us, too. To send the text. Make the phone call. Drop off the meal. And remember that sometimes the greatest act of patriotism is simply caring for your neighbor. INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  5. Jun 23

    The Borrowed Years Rule: Why "Someday" Is Costing You More Than You Think

    Takeaways Kayla opens up about the flood of emotions she experienced at her daughter's kindergarten graduation, connecting the bittersweet passage of time to the deeper reality of how finite our seasons with loved ones really are.The Borrowed Years Rule reframes the "I'll do it later" mindset — a concept Kayla applies with hard-won perspective after becoming a widow at 28.Kayla shares how spontaneity, from a last-minute Europe trip after losing her husband to impromptu weeknight pool runs with her kids, has become her answer to living a life with fewer regrets.In this solo episode of Connecting Through Cancer, Kayla Keenan reflects on the cascade of emotions that followed her daughter's kindergarten graduation. What started as a celebration quickly surfaced something deeper: the awareness that we only get 18 summers with our kids, and one of them was already behind her. Kayla shares how that moment opened the door to a broader conversation about time, loss, and what it actually means to be present. Kayla introduces the Borrowed Years Rule, a concept she discovered on Instagram that puts words to something she already knew from experience. The idea is simple but sobering: every time we say "I'll travel when I retire" or "I'll do that when the kids are older," we are borrowing time from a future that isn't guaranteed. For Kayla, who lost her husband Kyle to cancer after a four-year battle and became a widow at 28, this is not a theory. It is something she lived. She shares the story of planning a spontaneous 10-day Europe trip within a month of Kyle's passing — a decision she calls one of the most important she ever made. The episode closes with Kayla connecting these ideas back to everyday life: summer bucket lists, putting the tablets away, texting a friend even when schedules are impossible to align, and making Monday night pool trips happen just because the sun is out. The message is not that you need to travel the world. It is that now is the only time you have. INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  6. Jun 16

    Finding the 'Tin Foil Linings' Along a Breast Cancer Journey with Sara Kruger [REPLAY]

    In this episode of the INDY Foundation Connecting Through Cancer podcast, host Kayla Keenan speaks with Sara Kruger about her personal cancer journey, beginning with her diagnosis of invasive ductal carcinoma. Sara shares her experiences with family reactions, the importance of genetic testing, and the challenges of navigating treatment, especially after being classified as stage four. Throughout the conversation, they discuss the significance of community support, maintaining a positive outlook, and finding humor in difficult situations. Sara emphasizes the blessings that can arise from adversity and the strength found in connection with others. Takeaways INDY Foundation supports cancer warriors through financial and community support.Sara's cancer journey began with a persistent sore that led to a diagnosis.Receiving a cancer diagnosis can be overwhelming and unexpected.Family reactions to cancer can vary, but support is crucial.Genetic testing can reveal important information about cancer risks.Navigating treatment can be complicated, especially with insurance challenges.Living with stage four cancer requires ongoing monitoring and treatment.Maintaining a positive attitude is essential during cancer treatment.Community support can provide strength and comfort during difficult times.Finding humor and connection can help cope with the challenges of cancer.INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  7. Jun 2

    Embracing Every Season: Lessons from Graduation and Cancer Journeys

    Takeaways Why life transitions often bring both joy and grief simultaneouslyHow hardship can reshape the way we experience milestonesWhy embracing imperfect moments creates lasting memoriesGraduation season brings excitement, reflection, and change, but for families navigating cancer, grief, or unexpected hardship, these transitions can feel especially emotional. In this episode, Kayla shares personal reflections on her daughter’s kindergarten graduation, the inspiration behind the INDY Foundation scholarship, and a powerful scholarship essay that highlights resilience through adversity. This conversation explores how difficult seasons often exist alongside beautiful moments and why learning to embrace both is essential. Whether you're celebrating a preschool graduation, supporting someone through cancer treatment, or simply navigating a challenging season of life, this episode is a reminder that every moment matters. Key Topics Covered: The inspiration behind the INDY Foundation ScholarshipWhy technical education and trade careers matterLessons from a powerful scholarship recipient essayParenting reflections during kindergarten graduation seasonLiving through hardship while celebrating important milestonesFinding joy during difficult seasons of lifeWhy imperfect moments often become the most meaningful memoriesINDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

  8. May 26

    Legacy Over Success: Leading a Life of Impact [Replay]

    In this episode of Connecting Through Cancer, host Kayla Keenan reflects on the themes of legacy leadership, emphasizing the importance of significance over success. She shares personal anecdotes about her late husband Kyle and discusses how true leadership is about making a lasting impact on others. The conversation explores the idea of purpose-driven decision-making, investing in people, and the qualities that define a legacy leader. Kayla encourages listeners to think about their own legacies and the impact they want to leave behind. Takeaways Leadership applies to many areas of life, not just jobs.Legacy leadership is about how you make people feel.Success is about achievements; significance is about impact.Most people chase success, but legacy asks if it lasts.True leaders want to see others succeed.Investing in people creates lasting relationships.Integrity is crucial, even when unseen.Legacy leaders create more leaders, not followers.Purpose-driven decisions align with larger missions.Your legacy is shaped in private before it's seen.INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

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Welcome to the INDY Foundation: Connecting Through Cancer hosted by Kayla Keenan, founder of INDY Foundation, a non-profit located in central Minnesota. Here at INDY, we believe in supporting and connecting cancer warriors throughout their cancer journey. Our mission is to provide financial and community support to cancer warriors across Minnesota. Join us as we share inspiring stories, valuable resources and important updates to help you and your load ones navigate the challenges of cancer with strength and hope. Each episode will feature heartfelt conversations with cancer warriors, their families, and experts in the field, offering insights and encouragement for every step of the way. INDY is short for "I'm Not Done Yet," a phrase often said by the late Kyle Strand during his courageous battle with colon cancer. Kyle's four-year journey was both extremely challenging and profoundly beautiful. Though he lost his battle in July 2017, his legacy lives on through his two dying wishes: to establish the INDY Foundation and to inspire others to live every day to its fullest. In August 2017, the INDY Foundation was born, continuing Kyle's mission to support and uplift cancer warriors everywhere. Find more information here: www.indy-foundation.org Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/ImNotDoneYetMN Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/indyfoundation/ Join our INDY Tribe - Inner Circle FB Group. A group for those affected by cancer. https://www.facebook.com/groups/202854020588761

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