Montana preschool teacher battling cancer is surprised with a new car

Billings, Montana – A 2007 Chevy Tahoe was a Christmas gift from Hardin Chevrolet that one lucky teacher will never forget.

In November, preschool teacher Kylie Tiller of the Montana Audubon Center learned that she had stage 4 follicular lymphoma.

Since October, she and her four children have not owned a car and have been reliant on her boyfriend’s vehicle.

“I was just recently diagnosed with follicular lymphoma stage 4, so we’ve just been doing chemo and immunotherapy treatments for that and I started the week of Thanksgiving. So I just had my second round of chemo this week,” said Tiller.

Her boyfriend’s mother had nominated Tiller, and she notified friends and family about it.

They said they were only heading to the center for lunch, but when she got there, the staff from the dealership surprised her with the car.

“There was a lot of cars and people with phones and it took me several minutes to figure out what was happening,” said Tiller.

Hardin Chevrolet has been holding its Hearts for the Holidays Car Giveaway for fifteen years. The dealership selects one winner to receive a car.

The community nominates recipients depending on who might lack access to dependable transportation.

“If we can help someone in need, that’s really the goal,” said Joe Mavencamp, who works for the dealership and has witnessed all of the giveaways in the previous years. He said that they were inspired by Tiller’s story and resilience.

“(We) read some really great stories about her, sounds like a really amazing person, you know, that’s definitely been dealt a tough hand, but she’s fighting through it. It was one that really stood out to us and we were excited to meet her and seems like a neat family,” said Mavencamp.

Tiller will be needing this gift badly because he has a lot of doctor appointments in the upcoming months.

Additionally, it will support her and her family in all of their events and activities.

“Being able to get us to where we need to be, to school, to the doctor, to the hospital, wherever — is huge,” said Tiller. “This is amazing. We don’t have to walk places anymore or ask people for rides, I don’t have to call my friends to be like, ‘Hey, my son’s here, can you please come get him for me?’ It’s huge, it’s really, really important to us.”