I Walk For You, Mom

On Saturday, April 28th, my family, friends and I are walking the Hope, Steps, & A Cure Walk for MDS and bone marrow failure diseases in memory of my Mom.


My Mom recently passed away on March 13th this year, after a short battle with myelodysplastic syndrome, a rare type of blood cancer affecting less that 0.003% of the nation (yes, less than 1%).  This has been unbelievably difficult for all of us, as our lives have changed dramatically.  But I found this walk, which happens to be right in our back yard, and I immediately began my fundraising and awareness initiatives by forming Team Pat Reep.  Just two days after forming our team for Mom, we had raised nearly $2,000!  In two days!  It's now been a few weeks, and we have raised $9,630 through our fundraising page, plus an additional $3,000 that a dear friend of my mom and dad donated directly to the Aplastic Anemia and MDS International Foundation.  That makes a total of $12,630 for Team Pat Reep as of today, and we're still a week out!!  All I can say is that Mom would be so proud and very touched.


In addition to our campaign efforts, I designed shirts for us to wear on the walk.  My parents have always been huge Francophiles and traveled to France every year since 1992.  They love it.  So the quote we chose is from Le Petit Prince (The Little Prince), a French children's book, one which Mom read to us when we were little.  The quote means, "We see well only with the heart."  And on the back of the shirt is a photo my Dad took of Mom when they were both 23 years old.  We call it her "Rockstar" picture :)  I love it.  She's beautiful.

Front of shirt

Back of shirt

A dear family friend of our also designed and created silicone awareness bracelets.  They are in the colors red (for MDS) and white (for bone marrow failure).  The same quote that is on the shirts is on these bracelets.  Thank you so much KW for creating these for us!

I am so proud to be a part of this movement in raising awareness for MDS.  And more importantly, I am beyond thankful to everyone who has donated to our campaign and for those are are coming out to walk with us.  From my family to you, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts.