By Yonni Wattenmaker
Spring has finally sprung and it feels so bright and full of hope! It has been a busy few months since my last article. Things at Breast Cancer Alliance have been bustling but exciting: we announced in March that we would be able to fund $1.5mm in grants this year for underserved patient education and support, breast surgical fellowships and innovative, impactful research. What a meaningful way for our organization to come fighting back from the challenging days of the pandemic.
We held a series of events, from a virtual poker tournament and hybrid master wine course and tasting, to our exceptional webinar about male breast cancer with highly esteemed doctors and both survivors and a brother of a survivor sharing their stories of shock, challenges and perseverance. If you did not attend, the recording is on our website, and I encourage you to watch (there’s even a special celebrity guest…) We also had the pleasure of hosting long-missed events like our Annual Dinner and Junior Fashion show in person, enjoying the chances to mingle, laugh, reconnect and dare I say, hug!
At the core of BCA, both when it was founded as a Greenwich charity in 1996 and now as a national one, is community. We are so grateful to have large national corporate partners and individual donors across the US, but we are still committed to engaging with our friends and neighbors here at home. As was shared in my last piece, volunteerism is essential to the success we have achieved, and your support will only further our impact.
On May 1, thanks to the encouragement of our Advisory Council, Breast Cancer Alliance’s 5K Run/Walk for Hope will be back for the first time since 2019. Participants will be hosted and fed by Greenwich favorites Richards and Z Hospitality Group and we have a terrific team of sponsors supporting the morning. Whether you’re a survivor, patient or caregiver, family, friend or neighbor, grandparent, teen or parent of young children, this event is for you. We can’t wait to welcome you and stay fit with you! Exercise plays such an important role in prevention and recovery, so we are privileged to not only bring this fitness event back, but will be rounding it out with a weekend of fitness, wellness and beauty May 13-15 with events both live and virtual. I hope you will visit breastcanceralliance.org/events to register and see all we have in store.
As always, I welcome new ideas and new involvement. Whether you are new to town, or a longtime resident unfamiliar with our work, please reach out and see how you can find your place at BCA. If events are not your thing, maybe you have a personal story you’d like to share? Perhaps you’d like to join one of BCA’s grant committees to help determine how our annual funding should be spent? Would you be interested in joining one of our many zoom site visits to learn about the cutting-edge research BCA is funding, the doctors for whom it is affording a fellowship, or the patients whose lives are being impacted for the better with our education and outreach grants. Whatever you choose, I hope to see you soon.
