Counselor's Daughter to Walk in the Susan G. Komen Fund 3day Walk

The Counselor's daughter to walk in the Susan G. Komen Fund 3 day walk
Brave Army of Survivors is giving Cancer a fight for life.

Below is an e-mail I got recently from my sister, Colleen.

I think she can make her own case when it comes to having cancer. Cancer does not run in our family as far as anyone knows. She however has had five bouts with the dread disease. Each time she has been declared a survivor she has had to start the process over again and give up another piece of her body. The treatments have gotten better but they are still not anything you would wish on your worst enemy. My wife is recovering from a bout of uterine cancer currently and her mother is having surgery for skin cancer. In my wife's family there is a history of the disease.

If you are concerned about these diseases the Susan G. Komen Fund is one of the funds recognized by survivors as doing a great job with funding research and care.

Note from the Counselor's daughter:

This year marks my 25^th anniversary of having had Breast Cancer. I am one of the 30% who survived. That blessing brings with it a duty. I want to contribute to make sure that 25 years from now everyone can survive.

In August I will be walking 60 miles over 3 days (3, 4, and 5) here in Massachusetts with a lot of other women and men who are taking the time to commit to this cause.

In 1982 I had a 'modified radical mastectomy' to remove a malignant bleeding papiloma and a striated intraductal carcinoma that was growing into my chest wall. It had been growing for six years and would have taken my life. I was fortunate that it was discovered by an astute nurse. It was 5 years before I was allowed to undergo reconstructive surgery as I was not expected to be around that long. But here I am.

When they said it would be a 'modified' mastectomy I thought they meant that they would be taking less tissue - not more. I live with many impacts from the experience - but I liveand appreciate that fact.

In January I celebrated my sixty first birthday and decided to do something to mark the passage of 25 years of recovery. So I will walk.

I hope you will support me in my walk and celebrate my life with me.