Natalie Phelps, a Bainbridge Island schoolteacher turned world-renowned colon cancer advocate, died Nov. 10 on BI at the age of 42, succumbing to cancer-related complications.
Phelps’ contribution to the world of cancer awareness continues in the events she started, the messages she shared and the people she reached. She is remembered by her husband, two children, friends, colleagues, and those worldwide who resonated with her candor about her fight against colorectal cancer.
“Natalie was more than a fighter […] She didn’t just survive this diagnosis, she thrived. She created such a wonderful community of support and knowledge sharing, and touched so many lives,” wrote Phelps’ husband, Dr. Jeff Word, on social media. “I will never refer to it as her losing her fight, she won every single day in this battle, and we are grateful for the grace and grit that she always showed. 13 years together was entirely too short, but we often talked these last few years that we wouldn’t trade it for anything.”
Phelps was a lifelong Washingtonian. She was born in Spokane and raised in Seattle, then moved to BI in the early 2010s. As a student, she earned a Bachelor’s degree in History and Studio Art from Whitman College, followed by a Master’s of Education at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she was awarded a Foreign Language Area Studies Fellowship to study Arabic and Middle Eastern Studies.
She taught in Italy, Jordan, Egypt and Qatar throughout the 2000s, then returned to the U.S. for a role as an elementary school teacher at the Bainbridge Island School District. Word and Phelps met in Seattle, married in 2012 and had two children.
Shortly after the birth of her second child in early 2020, Phelps received a Stage IV colorectal cancer diagnosis. From that moment, she became an outspoken advocate of colon cancer awareness.
She started the annual Seattle Walk to End Colon Cancer, which raises funds for the national nonprofit Colorectal Cancer Alliance and its programs to screen, care, and cure the cancer strain. Phelps’ fundraising team, the “Posterior Posse,” consistently raised more than $15,000 per year for the medical group. She also served on the Education Engagement Committee of the Colorectal Cancer Care Alliance.
Her candid social media posts documenting her experience with colorectal cancer, as well as her messages about the importance of cancer research, drew the attention of many global news outlets. Phelps gave interviews to Ted Koppel on CBS Sunday Morning, the BBC World Service, and features in The Washington Post, CNN, and the Associated Press.
In recent years, Phelps began to speak out against federal defunding of cancer research programs. She noted rising rates of aggressive cancers in people under 50 — an urgent issue, she said.
“It makes zero sense, if you care about keeping America healthy, to reduce your medical research at a time when you have cancer rates rising in your younger population that are the ones working and driving the economy,” said Phelps in a May interview with CNN.
