Poolesville Relay For Life Unites Community to Fight Back Against Cancer - Survivors & Volunteers Welcome!

The American Cancer Society Needs You to Relay and Help Finish the Fight!  Poolesville Relay For Life, Sat., June 7, 2 p.m. at Whalen Commons Park  - Surrounding community invited!

www.RelayForLife.org/poolesvillemd or email najia.hasan@cancer.org or call 301.562.3600, ext. 23616.

                Like so many families in Poolesville, Chontelle Hockenbery’s family has battled cancer.  Her passion to fight back against cancer with the American Cancer Society’s Relay For Life began with her mother’s liver and lung cancer diagnosis in 2004.  Chontelle and her sister attended the Relay in nearby Damascus.  “We first started doing Relay to get my mom through this,” she says.  After her mother passed away, they decided to start their own Relay in their beloved town of Poolesville, in their mother’s memory.  The Relay has grown ever since.

Their dad Relayed annually until he, too, succumbed to cancer last year – a rare form called mesothelioma (asbestos cancer).    Other family members have also developed cancer.

“We’ve tried to channel a lot of negative into positive,” says Chontelle.  “Once we began our journey, we realized what the American Cancer Society does.  Our mission is to raise awareness in the community.  We say here’s where your money goes – to wigs, Look Good Feel Better classes, rides to treatment and more.

“We’ve involved our neighbors and friends.”  One neighbor, whose cancer awareness was raised through Relay, found a lump in his chest when he was putting on sunscreen and was diagnosed with male breast cancer.

Relay For Life is an overnight event that takes place in more than 5,000 communities across the U.S. with 4 million participants.  “Since cancer never sleeps, Relays last up to 24 hours and teams take turns walking around a track,” says Najia Hasan, specialist for Poolesville Relay For Life. “People set up campsites, and we have lots of activities to keep them going.  Not everyone stays all night.”

Poolesville’s Relay takes place at Whalen Commons Park in the middle of town and is family-oriented.  “We have great entertainment including two bands and a moon bounce.  The kids enjoy the community spirit and the reward of touching other people’s lives,” says Chontelle.

Laps have various themes.  The Survivors Lap is celebratory.  “There’s a Caregivers lap, a Western lap for which people dress up in cowboy hats and have stick ponies, a purple lap since purple is the color of Relay and a camouflage lap,” says Chontelle.

“A highlight of Relay is the Luminaria ceremony, just after dark, which is moving and inspiring,” says Najia.  “Participants light luminaries around a track and spell out the word HOPE to honor loved ones they’ve lost and those that are fighting.”

Funds raised from Relay provide free American Cancer Society services such as Reach to Recovery, Road to Recovery and Look Good, Feel Better and support the Society’s 24/7 cancer resource hotline.   The Society is the largest funder of cancer research outside the Federal Government and has provided grants to 47 Nobel Prize winners.

Join Relay For Life and help make this cancer’s last century!  You do not have to be a Poolesville resident to join – everyone is welcome!