Welcome to my Team In Training home page!

UPDATE: Special thanks to all of my donors and especially to the wonderful A & Team at Simplicity Decor for hosting a fundraising shopping night for LLS on Wednesday, April 20!

I'm training to participate in an adventure hike in Yosemite as a member of The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society's (LLS) Team In Training. As a Team In Training member, I am raising funds to help stop leukemia, lymphoma, Hodgkin lymphoma and myeloma from taking more lives. As many of you know, I tend to be pretty busy - work at Microsoft and my volunteer work on the Wing It Productions and Washington Wilderness Coalition boards is plenty to keep my schedule full. So why add something else to my plate now?

For me, the answer is simple. In February 2010, my dad was diagnosed with acute myelogenous leukemia (AML). He spent most of February and part of March in the hospital undergoing aggressive treatment that included emptying out all of his existing blood and replacing it with clean blood. Finally, he was well enough to go home, with the expectation that he would return to the hospital for a second round of aggressive treatment about 2 weeks later. Unfortunately, he had a separate complication with his blood that prevented additional treatment, and the doctor initiated in-home hospice care. On May 4th, he was gone.

I was stunned by how quickly everything happened. My dad and my mom had just visited me in Seattle for Christmas. My mom had surgery earlier in 2009, and the main concern I had was that she would be ok for the trip. When they arrived, my mom was fairly fit, but my dad was fatigued just walking through the air museum, and we ultimately took him to emergency room the day before he was scheduled to leave. They gave him a pint of blood to get his strength up. My dad and I joked about his vampiric tendencies. The doctors wanted him to stay to have more tests, but he wanted to go home, and I saw him off at the airport. The next time I saw him, he was in the hospital, alert but struggling, and the time after that, he was already in a coma.

For those who may have wondered about its origins, I have my dad's sense of humor. Because of him, I know which way the smoke blows when two electric trains are moving towards each other on opposing tracks.

I also have my dad's sense of doing what is right. Participating in finding a cure for blood cancer is the right thing to do. When Dad left Seattle, I still thought that whatever was wrong would be something the doctors could treat with a pill. Unfortunately, I was wrong. I am joining LLS' efforts so that the next daughter telling her father goodbye at the airport and believing that there is a pill for that fatigue problem can be right.

Please make a donation to support my participation in Team In Training and help advance LLS's mission.

I hope you will visit my web site often. Be sure to check back frequently to see my progress. Thanks for your support!