Two-time breast cancer survivor helps raise funds

CALGARY ? When the fear became almost unbearable, Rejeanne Taylor reminded herself that all she could do was put one foot in front of the other.

The two-time breast cancer survivor would walk to help cope with a disease that cruelly invaded her body twice ? once in 1998 requiring a mastectomy, and again eight years later, when she endured rounds of gruelling chemo therapy and radiation.

?When you?re out there walking, you?re not a cancer patient. You?re a vibrant, capable, physically strong person,? Taylor told the Herald. ?It was so important for me to have something beyond just the cancer in my life.?

Now cancer-free, Taylor walks to raise money and Sunday she added 40-kilometres to her running tally at the Weekend to End Women?s Cancers.

The annual 60-kilometre walk raised $1.8 million in support of the Alberta Cancer Foundation, which funnels dollars toward research and cancer therapies at the Tom Baker Cancer Centre and clinics across the province.

?It?s cancer. It?s mysterious and unpredictable, and that?s why we have to keep raising money for research. There?s too many children and too many young people that face this journey,? Taylor said.

One of those young people is 25-year-old Ashley Hart.

A month before her wedding day last July, doctors told Hart that she had breast cancer.

She faces surgery for a double mastectomy on Aug. 7, but Sunday she crossed the finish line with a smile on her face, flanked by family, having walked 60 kilometres to raise more than $13,000.

?I don?t really know how to take it easy. I golfed through my chemo,? Hart said. ?When you?re the person going through it, you just do what you have to do.?

When she was first diagnosed, Hart admits she felt angry.

?I was confused. At the time I wanted to know why it was happening to me and why it happened at 24,? she said. ?But I got those answers later.?

Doctors told Hart that she was a carrier of BRCA1 ? a rare, mutated gene responsible for increasing the risk for breast and ovarian cancers.

?I was more upset for my mom and my husband. My mom wished it was her and not me. That was upsetting.?

Organizers said the Weekend to End Women?s Cancers, the largest fundraiser for women?s cancers in Alberta?s history, has raised $47 million for the Alberta Cancer Foundation since its inception.

?This year in Alberta, 1,950 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer and 270 with gynecological (cancers). Funds raised by The Weekend are put to use immediately, and support cutting-edge research, the development of new therapies and prevention programs for breast, cervical, endometrial and ovarian cancers,? said Myka Osinchuk, CEO of the Alberta Cancer Foundation.

Close to a thousand Albertans participated in the two-day trek that ended Sunday.

mpotkins@calgaryherald.com

? Copyright (c) The Calgary Herald

Source: http://www.calgaryherald.com/health/time+breast+cancer+survivor+helps+raise+funds/6972806/story.html

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