Doing Something We Can Control

Yesterday I was not really looking forward to my run. It was a taper week for me so I only needed to run 9 miles but I just was not feeling motivated.  But when I got to the trail, everyone was in high spirits which instantly put a smile on my face.  Before we start running each week we always have what we call a mission moment. Usually we read a story about a patient or survivor that was sent to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society office, but ocassionally someone is brave enough to share a very personal story.  This weekend Amanda, who is just the sweetest, cutest thing ever, opened up to the group.  Now for privacy reasons I'm not going to give any details, but she really made us all choke up.  She told us about her brother who is struggling with illness.  An illness that has struck my own family.  I can't imagine how difficult it was for her to share with the group, but one thing she said really stuck with me.

Amanda said that none of us can control getting sick, who gets cancer, who dies from cancer or any other horrible disease, but we can control what we do to try to make sure that no more families lose a loved one.  No one else loses their best friend, brother, sister, mom, dad or grandparents. 

I haven't been able to get her words out of my head.  Everyone who is doing Team in Training is doing the only thing they can to control cancer.  Each of us is dedicating our time and bodies to raise money to help find a cure.  We could just sit around and wait for someone else to help fund patient programs or research, but instead we are out there, early on Saturday mornings, in the snow, ice, wind and cold for LLS.  We are doing what we can to change the world we live in, where cancer many times is a death sentence. 

We may not be able to control anything else, but we can control this.  Please help myself and my team help others by making a donation.  Any and every donation helps!  For the next week or maybe two, I will match every single donation to my efforts for The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society up to $400.  So make your donation really count!

P.S. Aaron and Amanda still have $6000 to raise in order to be able to do the Nashville Country Music Marathon...so if you want to donate to them too click here to visit their site.