Chelmsford's Mirisola Walks For Dana Farber in Honor of Fiance

For the past four years, Sue Mirisola, 40, of North Chelmsford, has participated in the Boston Marathon^® Jimmy Fund Walk. She returns as a walker year after year to give back to Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, the place where her late fiancé, Chris Sheehy, was treated.

In 2008, the couple had been together for only a couple of years.  Sheehy, then 36, began experiencing severe back pain.  Several months passed and he was admitted into the hospital with pneumonia and kidney failure.  It took nearly two months before he was diagnosed with angiosarcoma, a rare form of cancer that is commonly found in the skin or soft tissue. Less than two months after he was diagnosed, Sheehy passed away. The couple never had the chance to make it to the altar. 

Sheehy was Mirisola’s best friend and the love of her life. “He was the strongest, most courageous, funny, loving man,” says Mirisola. He is the reason she formed Team Chris Sheehy, a group of friends and family members, including her daughter, Emily, who participate in the Boston Marathon Jimmy Fund Walk to raise money for adult and pediatric patient care and cancer research for Dana-Farber. Sheehy is also the reason she walks wearing a faded Boston Red Sox baseball cap, a hat that Chris wore constantly after he lost his hair from chemotherapy.

Mirisola has since kept a running list of friends and family members who are battling or have battled cancer, which she carries in her back pocket as she walks. Among the people on this list are her father, brother-in-law, grandfather, uncles, cousin and those people her friends have asked her to add. Each year, at the start of the Walk, members of Team Chris Sheehy gather to read the list of names out loud. The growing list is what motivates the team to continue to raise money for Dana-Farber.

“I started the team in memory of Chris, but over the years I started to walk in honor of family members and friends who have or have had cancer,” says Mirisola. “I do this so that no one else has to go through what they went through.”

The Boston Marathon Jimmy Fund Walk, presented by Hyundai, is a one-day charity walk that supports all cancers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. The event provides participants a unique opportunity to walk the historic Boston Athletic Association’s (BAA) Boston Marathon^® route and to raise money for Dana-Farber. The BAA has supported the Jimmy Fund Walk for 24 years.

This year will mark Mirisola’s fifth year walking. She will embark on the 5-mile route that starts at Boston College. Her goal is to become a Pacesetter, a walker who raises $1,250 or more. On Sunday, Sept. 9, Mirisola, alongside members of Team Chris Sheehy, will join an expected 9,000 walkers, who will walk up to 26.2 miles to raise $7.5 million for lifesaving adult and pediatric patient care and cancer research at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.  Since its 1989 inception, the Walk has raised more than $80 million.

“Every penny counts; People don’t have to walk, they can just donate,” says Mirisola. “It doesn’t matter how the money is raised, we just need to fund a cure.”

To register for the Jimmy Fund Walk, or to support Mirisola and Team Chris Sheehy, please visit www.JimmyFundWalk.org or call (866) 531-9255.