Prologue

Breast cancer has been a part of my life pretty much as far back as I can remember. I was in my early 20’s when my Aunt Brenda was diagnosed with breast cancer for the first time. My sister and I, all the women in our family, were now considered ‘high risk’. We learned about self-breast exams. We had baseline mammograms done in our mid 30’s. That’s just the way it is.

I first learned of the Breast Cancer 3-Day nearly a decade ago. I was working in Sunnyvale at the time and from the office window I watched hundreds of women walk by on their journey. I thought about doing it then but life and its many events got in the way.

Fast forward to last summer. My sister found a lump in her breast. (She found it herself and even when the doc could feel it too, the mammogram still didn’t show it. There’s a lesson here – mammograms are a critical tool in diagnosing breast cancer but don’t forget monthly self-exams. Ladies – do your self-exams. Gentlemen – insist that the women in your life do them. Squeeze ‘em for a reason, baby!!)

Even with a lifetime of being high risk, this threw me for a loop. This was different. This was our generation, my generation. My sister is just 10 months younger than I am. It was no longer something the older generations of women dealt with (by this time my mother and my paternal grandmother had been diagnosed too).

I have a daughter. I have a niece. I have female cousins and they too have daughters. I have a brand new granddaughter.

This has to stop. Now. Breast cancer needs to be stopped.

I want my granddaughter to grow up in a different world: a world without breast cancer.

With Dave’s cross-country move last summer, there was not time for fundraising and training and preparing. But I vowed I would make the time in 2009.

The time to talk was over. It was time to walk the walk. Literally.

This banner was part of the stage background at the opening ceremony. I was immediately drawn to its message as a visualization of my reason, of my purpose in walking – We walk because we must. We are strong because the journey demands it. Together in body and united in spirit, we lay down our footsteps for this generation and the next. This is our promise:

A world without breast cancer.