- April 28, 2024
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Relay for Life teams will honor caregivers and survivors.
Wayne Grant
News Editor
When a person is diagnosed with cancer, they are like a boxer in the ring. They go back to their corner, and get ready to fight.
That’s one of the things that cancer survivor Mia Bryant will be telling people on April 18, as speaker at the Relay for Life for the American Cancer Society.
She said it’s important for cancer patients to have people in the corner, giving them a strong support system, and that’s why the Relay of Life is important.
“They let people know they are not alone.”
Bryant said a diagnosis of cancer does not mean it’s “the end,” and she should know. When she was 14 years old, she was in the final stages of Hodgkin’s disease, and now at the age of 42, she has been cancer-free for 24 years.
She was misdiagnosed for two years before the cancer was discovered, because of a mistake in the lab, and that’s why the cancer was able to grow until it was fully metastasized in her body.
She said she was told she would not make it.
“There must have been another plan in place,” she said. “I’m still here.”
She had radiation that was much more intense than given today, chemotherapy and 50 operations to remove tumors and have her knees replaced because they had been damaged by the radiation.
Originally from South Carolina, Bryant now lives in Palm Coast, and spends her time helping cancer patients with her nonprofit company, Embraced in Arms of Hope.
Bryant said the work being done by the American Cancer Society continues to improve cancer treatments, so people suffer fewer ill effects from the radiation and chemotherapy that she endured as a teenager. Also, the survival rate continues to climb.
This year’s Relay for Life will be noon to midnight on April 18 at Calvary Christian Church, 1687 W. Granada Blvd. So far, 32 teams have raised almost $17,000.
Kendra Bright, one of the organizers, said their goal is $30,000 and they plan to continue collecting money until mid-July.
The Relay will begin with a survivors’ lap and then a caregivers’ lap. The survivors and caregivers will enjoy a meal, and the teams will begin their relay walk which will last until midnight.
Bright encourages people to come out, saying there will be food, games and entertainment. People can also purchase a luminary candle that will be placed by the track to honor a victim of cancer.
“The event is to celebrate what we’ve accomplished and to raise awareness and funds,” she said. She said funds from Relay for Life have supported research that has made cancer “not so deadly.”
Money is also used for education, to promote mammograms, colonoscopies and prostate exams.
