RELAY FOR LIFE SAN BRUNO CA
DATE: Saturday April 23rd 2016
Find out what's happening in San Brunofor free with the latest updates from Patch.
EVENT TIME: 9:00 a.m. until 11:00 p.m.
LOCATION: Capuchino High School football field
Find out what's happening in San Brunofor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Pam and I support the American Cancer Society’s mission and Relay For Life San Bruno CA
American Cancer Society’s MISSION Statement:
The American Cancer Society is the nationwide community-based voluntary health organization dedicated to eliminating cancer as a major health problem by preventing cancer, saving lives, and diminishing suffering from cancer, through research, education, advocacy, and service.
YOU can join us with your support:
GOTO www.RelayForlife.org/SanBrunoCA
E=Mail with your questions: sanbrunorfl@gmail.com
YOU can become a virtual team member
Click on the SIGNUP icon if you want to become a participant
Click on the DONATE icon and you will be offered 3 options:
1-Donate to a Participant –
Pam Riechel and Robert Riechel are participants
2-Donate to a Team –
Crusaders For A Cure is Pam’s and Robert’s Team
3-Donate to This Event
Clicking on View More Event Information will take you to:
ANNOUNCEMENTS icon where you can read our event/team announcements – info to be posted soon
LOCAL FUNDRAISERS icon where you can read about upcoming activities – info to be posted soon
EVENT SPONSORSHIP icon where you can learn how to become an event sponsorship and have your company name or individual name shown on various event items – info to be posted soon
At the bottom of the page you will find links to:
What is Cancer
Cancer Prevention
Why we fundraise
The American Cancer Society
Find A Relay Event
Donate To Fight Cancer
Dedicate A Luminaria
Volunteer At Relay
Employer Matching Gifts
What Is Relay
Relay For Everyone
College Relay
Relay Mobile App
REMEMBER: Those with cancer can need help and support 24 hours a day 7 days a week, holidays included. The American Cancer Society is available 365/24/7 at 1-800-227-2345 where you can talk to a live person who will be able to direct you to the local support you need.
Below is just one person’s story of how CANCER and the American Cancer Society affected her life.
Natalie’s fight is one reason why WE ALL FIGHT to END THE FIGHT.
Natalie McQueen
Relay For Life of Mountain View
Silicon Coastal Region
“I don’t look at life the same way; never on the sidelines.”
My introduction to cancer came about when I was in elementary school. I walked in the house one day to find my mom sobbing and when I asked her what was wrong she dried her tears and told me that my grandmother was just diagnosed with cancer. I was shocked but my mom, through her red, puffy eyes somehow convinced me that Grandma was going to be okay. When I was in middle school my mom and dad called me into the living room and sat me down to tell me that my mom had just been diagnosed with the same kind of cancer that Grandma had. Again, they made an effort to make me believe that everything was going to be alright.
A few years after that my grandmother died from her cancer. And six months later, my own mother was killed by her cancer. The last picture ever taken of my mother was a small Polaroid that my dad took of her while she was laughing. I have that picture, now framed, sitting on my bedside table. Of course, I didn’t know it was going to be the last picture of her and when I look at it now, I see the swollen lymph nodes in her neck and know what they portend.
Twenty-five years later I was sitting on my couch and brushed my hand across my neck and felt a lump. Instantly I know what it meant. So in June of 2006 I was diagnosed with Follicular Lymphoma, a very similar type of cancer to what my mom and grandmother had. I knew that I was going to die, even though I presumed that a lot of research had been done in the intervening years. But between you and me, deep down, I didn’t have much hope.
The first thing you learn about Follicular Lymphoma when you Google it is that it is slow growing (yeah!) but incurable (ugh). I quickly learned to stop Googling it and appointed a friend to be Chief Googler. She was the one who did all of my research for me and then told me what she learned without putting in all of the scary statistics.
I ended up having chemo for six months and that stuff didn’t agree with me very well. I became sicker than expected and spent a lot of time in bed. The only highlight from that entire time, that I can remember, is when the Chief Googler came and picked me up and took me to a Look Good...Feel Better program. I walked into the room, pretty nervous, not sure what I was going to find. What I discovered was a room full of bald women who were there to learn scalp care and make-up tips and who knew how to laugh. I don’t specifically remember what we laughed about, I just remember laughing a lot that day, I think because I could feel comfortable and be myself.
According to the Chief Googler, the average remission for Follicular Lymphoma is two years. Imagine my horror when they found a tumor growing in my left groin at my three month scan. This terrified me so much that I had a hard time thinking about it. I ended up sinking into a depression mixed with extreme anxiety that made me unpleasant to live with.
About this time I saw an blurb in the local paper inviting all cancer survivors to come to something called Relay For Life, and if you came, you got a free t-shirt. Well, you didn’t have to ask me twice. I showed up, put my purple shirt on, and milled about waiting for the survivor lap to start. I didn’t feel much like a survivor but I figured that this lap was something I had to participate in in order to get the shirt. While I was waiting, my husband ran into a woman who he used to work with. The last time he had seen her she was going through chemo and he was pleased to see her again. He introduced me to her and I noticed that she looked completely normal. It was so nice to see someone bounce back after treatment. Meeting her that day did give me a glimmer of hope - that maybe there could be life after cancer.
My doctors kept an eye on that tumor in my groin and eventually decided that it was starting to grow faster and that made them nervous so they took it out to biopsy it. My oncologist pointed her skinny finger at me and stressed that this was not going to cure me of my cancer. They were taking it out just to see if my lymphoma had transformed - a bad thing. The results from that biopsy showed that it was the same old kind of lymphoma that I had been dealing with all along so that was the good news.
I kept having scans after that but they didn’t show any tumors anywhere. I was terrified before each scan but the results were always the same - clear. My scans became less and less frequent and eventually my oncologist told me that she was surprised that I still appeared cancer-free.
I was invited to a breakfast given to honor doctors who have received money from the American Cancer Society to do research and like all American Cancer Society events, one of those doctors got up to give a speech. She was from Stanford and she studied lymphoma. She said that day, as I ate my rubber eggs and drank the tepid coffee, that they now believe that lymphoma has stem cells and if you can kill the stem cells then you can cure the lymphoma. Everything stopped. I’d never heard the c-word used with my kind of cancer. “Cure.” I didn’t know how to even think about this. I now believe that the tumor that started growing in my groin contained the stem cells for my cancer and they removed them when they took that node out to biopsy it. I believe that I am cured of my cancer. The fear, terror, depression, and anxiety that lived with me for all of those years is gone.
I know that the American Cancer Society didn’t cure my cancer but they played a huge role in saving my life.
Relayforlife.org 1-800-227-2345 – 24 hours a day 7 days a week for support and referrals
Photo Credit: San Bruno CA Patch Archives
Source Credit: ACS, Natalie McQueen, & Robert Riechel
