In this conversation, we sit down with Amanda Goodstadt, Senior Staff Attorney at Triage Cancer, where she develops educational materials, leads trainings, and provides individual assistance through the organization's Legal & Financial Navigation Program. Amanda also oversees Triage Cancer's Legal Advisory Council and Pro Bono Network, and represents the organization on the American Bar Association's Cancer Legal Advocacy Interest Group, the New York State Cancer Consortium, and other national coalitions working at the intersection of law, advocacy, and cancer care.

What makes Amanda's work so deeply resonant is that it is not only professional — it is personal. Married to a cancer survivor, caregiver to her mother through her final two years, and no stranger to loss, Amanda came to this work through her own life. She knows, from the inside, what it feels like to be handed a diagnosis and a stack of paperwork in the same breath.

Amanda and Dr. Sam walk gently through the terrain that so often arrives alongside a cancer diagnosis — the questions no one thinks to ask until they are already standing in the middle of them.

Together they explore:

• Where to begin after a diagnosis, and why work is rarely a simple binary of "keep going" or "stop"
• Understanding your own employee benefits — sick leave, PTO, flex time, telecommuting, donated hours, and disability insurance you may not even know you have
• The FMLA, the ADA, and how state and local laws quietly extend those protections
• Reasonable accommodations, and how to speak with your employer, your HR team, and your own healthcare providers about what you need
• Disclosure — who to tell, what to say, and how to prepare scripts for the tender and unexpected questions that come from colleagues, family, and friends
• Short-term and long-term disability, and the paperwork the medical team may be asked to fill out on your behalf
• The overlap between financial health, medical adherence, and outcomes — and why addressing the non-medical side of a diagnosis is a form of clinical care
• Survivorship as it truly is — beginning at the moment of diagnosis, not at the end of treatment

Amanda also speaks to caregivers — the partners, parents, siblings, and friends quietly holding everything else together — and to metavivors, whose survivorship never has a clean finish line.

Above all, she offers what she calls the empowerment of knowing. Because a diagnosis often makes a woman feel she has lost control over everything happening to her — and Amanda's whole life's work is to hand a piece of that control gently back.

She also shares how to reach Triage Cancer's Legal & Financial Navigation Program directly, where you can submit a few basic questions and schedule a call with one of their staff attorneys — a free, national resource that so many people say only one thing about after using it: I wish I had known about you sooner.About our Guest:

Amanda Goodstadt is the Senior Staff Attorney at Triage Cancer, where she develops educational materials, leads trainings, and provides individual assistance through the organization’s Legal & Financial Navigation Program. She also oversees Triage Cancer’s Legal Advisory Council and Pro Bono Network.

Amanda represents Triage Cancer on the American Bar Association’s Cancer Legal Advocacy Interest Group, the New York State Cancer Consortium, and other national coalitions. Drawing from her personal caregiving and cancer experiences, she is passionate about helping individuals navigate the legal and practical challenges of a diagnosis.

What does it mean to truly live well after a melanoma diagnosis?

In this heartfelt episode of Beyond the Clinic: Living Well with Melanoma, Dr. Samantha Siegel sits down with melanoma advocate Mary Margaret Braddock to discuss her journey from a Stage IB melanoma diagnosis at age 40 through three recurrences—and ultimately to no evidence of disease.

Mary Margaret shares the emotional realities of living with uncertainty, balancing hope and fear, navigating survivorship, and discovering purpose through advocacy. Together, she and Dr. Siegel explore the challenges that often continue long after treatment ends, including scan anxiety, post-traumatic growth, finding a "new normal," and the healing power of connecting with others who understand the experience.

This inspiring conversation reminds us that survivorship isn't simply about reaching the end of treatment—it's about learning how to live fully while carrying both the challenges and the gifts that cancer can leave behind.

In this episode, you'll learn about:

• Living through multiple melanoma recurrences
• Coping with uncertainty and scan anxiety
• The emotional journey of survivorship
• Finding meaning through patient advocacy
• The value of peer support and connecting with others
• Building resilience while embracing life's new normal
• Why community can be one of the most powerful forms of healing

Whether you're newly diagnosed, living with melanoma, supporting a loved one, or navigating life after treatment, this conversation offers encouragement, practical wisdom, and hope for the road ahead.

About our Guest:

Mary Margaret Braddock was initially diagnosed in 2016 with stage 1B melanoma at just 40 years old. Over the next decade, she experienced three additional recurrences; as of December 2025, she has no evidence of disease.

Her personal battle with melanoma has motivated her to raise awareness, fund research, and advocate for other patients. Her engaging personality makes her a natural public speaker, leading to invitations to school events and appearances in local media, where she encourages newly diagnosed patients and connects with fellow survivors.

Since 2023, Mary Margaret has served as Chair of AIM at Melanoma’s Steps Against Melanoma walk in Tampa, Florida. This role has been especially meaningful to her because it afforded her the opportunity to raise funds for melanoma research while promoting sun safety in her home state.

Most recently, her advocacy work has included attending the Melanoma Research Foundation’s Hill Day events and the Melanoma Research Alliance Research Retreat, where she contributed the patient perspective to their ongoing efforts.

Mary Margaret’s journey has been both physical and emotional. At every stage, she has navigated the coexistence of shock and survival, gratitude and grief, and setbacks and growth. She says that embracing this balance is the key to holding on to hope and adapting to a new normal.

Sexual health is an important part of quality of life, yet it remains one of the least discussed topics in cancer care. In this episode of Beyond the Clinic: Living Well with Melanoma, Dr. Samantha Siegel is joined by cancer survivor, advocate, and executive director of After Cancer, Erin Sullivan Wagner, to explore the lasting impact cancer treatment can have on intimacy, relationships, body confidence, and overall well-being.

Drawing from her own experience as a cancer survivor, Erin shares how unaddressed treatment side effects changed her life and inspired her to help transform the way healthcare providers approach sexual health conversations with patients. Together, she and Dr. Siegel discuss why these conversations matter, common barriers that prevent them from happening, practical strategies for patients and partners, and how survivors can advocate for the care and support they deserve.

Whether you are newly diagnosed, living with melanoma, navigating survivorship, or supporting a loved one, this thoughtful conversation offers reassurance, practical guidance, and a reminder that sexual health is an essential part of whole-person cancer care—not an afterthought.

Our Guest: Erin Sullivan Wagner is a cancer survivor, patient advocate, and Executive Director of After Cancer, a nonprofit organization dedicated to improving sexual health and intimacy for people affected by cancer. After undergoing treatment for anal cancer, Erin found that the long-term effects on her sexual health and intimate relationship were never discussed by her healthcare team—a gap in care that inspired her life's work.

Today, Erin advocates for patients, raises awareness, and educates oncology professionals about the importance of incorporating sexual health into comprehensive cancer care. Through After Cancer, she helps individuals and couples navigate the physical and emotional challenges of survivorship, including changes in libido, body image, fertility, dating, intimacy after ostomy surgery, pelvic floor dysfunction, LGBTQ+ relationships, and more. Her mission is to ensure that no cancer survivor has to face these deeply personal challenges without information, support, and hope.