It’s high time that I move this post about the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer from drafts to published. These thoughts have been waiting patiently for over a week, just asking for some tweaking. Read on…

On the Saturday that the Walk began, all 2,900 of us started walking along Lake Michigan, the sun beaming down on us. Someone passed me, and said as she pointed at my back, “You give me hope! I’m a 2-year survivor!” I paused for a minute, forgetting what my back said. Earlier in the morning, I had pinned a sign on my back listing the women I was walking for, including myself, a 15-year survivor.

Hope. What a powerful word.

Other words walkers wore read:

“I’d rather have blisters than chemo.”

“I’m walking for MY WIFE —->”

“Two year survivor”

“Mom of a two year survivor”

Before the walk even took place, I needed to ask people for donations. A lot of donations. The required amount of money I had to raise in order to walk was $1,800. It’s one of the reasons I couldn’t convince other family members to walk with me. Fundraising was daunting, especially when some of these thoughts occurred to me in the weeks before the Walk.

Breast cancer gets a lot of attention. What about other cancers?

More money is needed in metastatic cancer research.

Instead of money going to treatment, we need money for research to determine the cause of breast cancer.

How can we know for sure where our money is going??

Despite all these thoughts and doubts about the rightness of raising so much money for the Avon Foundation, I think I can say with certainty that those of us walking were walking to DO SOMETHING.

DO SOMETHING…it’s why one of my walking partners swore she would finish the walk for her mother — who has been receiving weekly chemo treatments. Sara was limping in pain as she walked those 26 miles. She later found out she tore some muscles in her ankle. She needed to DO SOMETHING for her mom.

Just like Sara, I needed to DO SOMETHING in memory of my mom. I needed to DO SOMETHING to celebrate fifteen years of survival after my breast cancer diagnosis.

That SOMETHING was to raise money for the Avon Foundation and to walk a marathon and a half in two days.

And this cancer survivor DID SOMETHING!

Beaming with pride, my family met me at the finish line!

For a detailed account of the recipients of the $6.1 million we raised in Chicago, please click here.