Racing to Save Lives

1. We are old

2. We are NOT runners

3. 26.2 miles is a REALLY long way (and did we mention we are not runners?!)

4. We have too many achy places (we won’t go into details!)

These are just a FEW of the excuses we could use NOT to run. Oh, we have MANY more reasons not to run… in fact we say them to each other regularly!

But we know the stories of Caleb, Katie and Clayton… and we HATE what it has done to our family and theirs. We want to do something to help wipe out blood cancers so that it will not happen in families any more, so NO MORE EXCUSES!

Our son, Caleb is 14. For his fourteenth birthday we celebrated by having a few friends over (who had to be health screened in order to attend). We could not go to Sky High or the Sun Splash water slides like he wanted to… too many chances for infections. At the end of the day we kissed him good night, we flushed his broviac line and we prayed for him to find a perfect match for a bone marrow transplant, so that he might see his 15th birthday.

Katie, a beautiful 15 year old girl, skipped a few of her end of the year activities when she found out her Acute Mylogenous Leukemia had relapsed. She later found out that her heart, damaged in the first rounds of chemo, may not be strong enough for the needed relapse treatments.

Clayton was diagnosed with Biphenotypic Leukemia (both ALL and AML). Clayton’s prom was held at Lucille Packard Children’s Hospital in a conference room. All the kids from the hospital school (aka, his new friends) would be there. Although he had his “dress up clothes” ready to go he had to skip the prom when he came down with a fever. Instead of a limo ride, he took an ambulance ride and got readmitted to the hospital.

To honor these heroes and their families we have put our excuses aside and decided to run the Nike Women’s Marathon October 17, 2010. We have joined Team in Training (a fundraising arm of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society) to help raise money for research into finding a cure for Leukemia, Lymphoma and all blood cancers.

Four Points To Ponder:

1. A marathon is 26.2 miles…of running… did I mention we are NOT runners?!

2. To everyone who donates we will be asking you to send us names of people who are cancer survivors, victims or patients… we will put their names on our jerseys and run in their honor or memory.

3. We would love for you to donate any amount to help wipe out blood cancers.

4. We would LOVE it if you would pass this letter on to anyone and everyone you know who could/should donate to this cause.

Thanks in advance for the help!

Steve and Susie McNitt, Proud parents of Noah and Caleb