Monday, September 8, 2008

Stand up to Cancer

I watched Stand up to Cancer Friday evening with my 4 year old daughter Caroline. It seemed like Caroline was really into it. She was interested in watching it which made me proud and she was asking some questions. Does everyone have cancer? Do I have cancer? These are all questions we can easily answer to a teenager or young adult, but they are hard to answer for children 4 years old.

I took it very slow in answering her and wanted to stress that not everyone had cancer and she did not have cancer. However, my little girl was smart enough to say “then why did you have cancer.” That is where I she got me. That is exactly the reason why it was important to have Stand Up to Cancer.

We do not know why I had cancer, nor do we know why anyone has cancer.

During the course of the program while sitting with Caroline answering what seemed to be hundred different questions I started to get a bit glassy eyed. Caroline was telling me how she remembered after my surgery and I had to stay in bed and now I have, as she said “a big scar” on my stomach. That hit me hard. She was only 2 years 8 months old at the time of my surgery and she still remembers it.

Cancer leaves both physical and mental scars. I carry the physical scar and Kristy, Caroline and I will each have mental scars.

Here is something I have been wanting to post for a few days but I was sick since Friday so I stayed away from the PC for a while.

There are thousands of people who work to fight cancer everyday of their lives and lately I have been reading blogs and comments to blogs that people are not as impressed with Stand Up to Cancer. They think it was made celebrity centric and not about the people who really work on fighting cancer day in/out.

I say it was a good thing as many of the celebrities were cancer survivors and/or were touched by cancer in some way. No one would tune in to watch Brian Dowd, but they certainly would to watch the network news anchors Brian, Katie and Charlie, Lance Armstrong, Carrie Underwood, Mariah Carey, Beyoncé, Mary J. Blige, Rihanna, Fergie, Sheryl Crow, Melissa Etheridge, Natasha Bedingfield, Miley Cyrus and a host of other celebrities.

Fighting cancer is about getting everyone to help us finally beat it. I do not care who you are. We need you to help us in the fight and if you are a celebrity we can use your fame to help us raise awareness and raise money, etc.

This is not about who does more. It is about joining together to WIN the fight. Remember what they said, “THIS IS WHERE THE END OF CANCER BEGINS.”

Stand Up to Cancer was a great program and is a great organization. I hope we can see more of this in the future.