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Walk for the Cure a Team Effort
VALLEY LEE - 10/10/2009
By Tamara Spak
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EDITOR’S NOTE: October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. When TheBAYNET.com received the following letter, we decided that this submission fit perfectly with the theme and for a good cause. The author, Tamara Spak has had to deal with the pain, loss and the tragedy of breast cancer first hand. Her mother died of the disease four years ago in March. What follows is her story.
After those two dreadful years things got better, as well as my mom. She went into full remission for three years. Things were finally looking up. My father was able to create a good standing with his employer again and my mom was going back into the workforce herself. Then the unexpected happened. The day before my birthday, May 15, 2004, my mother was taken to the hospital for headaches. It was discovered that her cancer had come back, not only in her chest wall, but also her brain. The doctors gave her 10 months to live. I didn’t say anything until I was in the parking lot next to my car, by myself. I fell to the ground and cried my eyes out. I was thinking: What am I going to do? I have never felt so helpless in my life.
She was supposed to grow old and I was supposed to take her under my wing and care for her like she did me as a child. It was then I knew that this was it. I was there for my mom a much as I could be. The doctors were right, three days shy of exactly ten months, my nightmare came true. My mom passed away on March 12, 2005 at 12:08 pm. 9 days after her forty-ninth birthday. I will never forget that day. I watched her struggle and I helped her cross over to a better place. I was 22 years old, still in need of my mother. I often ask, "Why? She was too young, I'm too young. Who is going to teach me to be an adult? Who is going to teach me to cook, tidy a house, and raise a child? Why did God punish me and take her away?” Over time I realized that God didn’t punish me. He was helping her. Cancer is what took her away and God took her to a better place; a place that there are no illnesses, like cancer. Now at the age of 27, I have a daughter, a fiancée and I am a homeowner. I have learned how to handle these things by remembering what my mom did while I was growing up. I had the best mom in the world and no one could ever replace her. I don’t think of my mom as dead, because she is not. I often talk to her and I know that she is always there looking over me. What I have learned since my mother’s passing is that three million women are living with breast cancer – one third of them do not even know it? Even more startling, breast cancer kills approximately one woman every 13 minutes, taking away mothers, grandmothers, sisters and best friends. No one knows what causes breast cancer or how it can be prevented and there is currently no known cure. Knowing these statistics and since cancer has unfortunately touched my family, I feel even more compelled to do something to bring us one step closer to finding a cure.
As of now, The Southern Maryland Pink Hooters consists of eight dedicated women. These women are, Tamara Spak, Lindsay Groves, Brittany Salmon, Alicia Mattingly, Karamie Platt, Jaime Grusholt, Clara Beth Crestsinger and Stephanie Fernandez. These women will participate in the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in Washington D.C. In the next few months we will all train together, fundraise together and provide support for each other in preparation for our great weekend in May.
We are asking everyone to please support our team. Visit our team page. You can make a donation to any team member by clicking on their name, and you’ll be taken to their personal page. If you'd prefer to write a check, just contact one of us and we'll send you the form and information. Also, if you would like to join the team and walk with us in May, Contact Tamara Spak via email – tamara.spak@gmail.com. |
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