Pink Tour of Friends part 2

Hi friends! I have another Pink Tour of friends for your enjoyment. Sorry it’s been forever since the first one but cancer is still happening over here. I might not have cancer anymore but I wake up thinking and feeling cancer everyday. I’m still not feeling “better”. I am having daily issues with headaches, nausea, body and joint aches/pains, and constant GI issues. In great news all the follow up testing ordered by my panel of doctors has been coming back clear. But with that good news comes the daunting exhaustion of finding answers for my discomfort. I’m starting a new medicine this week that I am hopeful will help! On top of that I have elected to have my right breast spacer removed, which will be happening tomorrow! This is for a various amount of reasons that I’m not 100% ready to share yet but I promise to do soon. For you and for I. In the meantime some feel good pink love!

Most of these companies I reached out to myself but many of them have the option for you to nominate a patient or survivor. Nominating a thriver that you currently know might need some snail mail love is a great way to help without doing much or maybe you're far away! I am constantly being asked by others what people can do to help their loved one. This is one small thing you can do! You can find resources, information, and sometimes freebies! The best weapon to bring to this war is knowledge! I have found so many amazing resources that have thought of almost everything for people going through a cancer diagnosis. I am going to take you back and introduce you to some of the first friends I made along my "Pink'' journey and how they helped me…

Sharsheret www.sharsheret.com

This is a Jewish based company that provides women and men with support before, during, and after their breast cancer journey. They supported me in a couple ways!

-Busy Box is a box of new toys and activities to help keep my little ones busy on bad days following treatment. They sent a wide range of things for all my girls. (My girls were 11, 6, and 2 during treatment.) I kept the box on the top of a cabinet only dad and I could reach. Once a week they were allowed to pick one goodie each. As people gifted us small toys along the way we added them to the stash. It lasted all summer and saved me many times!

-Best Face Forward kit is a makeup and skin care kit that I used to help offset some of my physical appearance changes. They send a sampling of skin care and some make up items. It also included eyebrow stencils. I will note here that I also used some of their online videos to help me apply my makeup. I used to teach a class on this topic and let me tell you what its SO much harder when it’s you.

-Survivorship Kit is something I had stored away till I was closer to the end of treatment. It came with a binder of information that has helped me start to reintroduce certain foods and ideas as I began exercising again. They included support information for transitioning into survivorship. Still studying this.

Living Beyond Breast Cancer https://www.lbbc.org/

LBBC is a national nonprofit that strives to help the world understand there is more than one way to have breast cancer. Amen. Right there that was all I needed to hear, I knew this was a resource I needed. Originally they provided my family with a set of books to read with the kids. We loved them. Ali (7) is who struggled the most originally. She knew enough to be scared but not enough to understand. The books helped. See more on them in my “Telling my children I have Cancer” blog. I have recently joined one of their facebook platforms and have been enjoying having people who understand to talk too!

Love Her Hug Her www.loveherhugher.com

I loved this gift! Love Her Hug Her is a company that was started by three sisters (hello instant love!) after their family had experienced cancer a total of 4 times. It is a shop or subscription box that offers support to the mind, body, and soul. Their products are vast and cover a large amount of patient needs. They also have a registry option so if you are someone who knows what they like and want to be able to offer your friends and family a start to showering you with love this is a great way! I got fun socks, some teas to sample, and snacks. I loved receiving this message from my cousins!

Little Pink Houses of Hope www.littlepink.org

Little Pink got a whole blog review by yours truly which you can read by searching “Beaches, bikers, and depression” in my past post. Little Pink is a nonprofit that serves families by providing them with a week-long retreat to a vacation home with other breast cancer patients. Since covid was still getting under control we were invited to a a week vacation where we only did experiences with our family. I can’t imagine how much more awesome it is when you have others along for the fun! They provided our family with a whole week of bright memories during a very dark time!

Tenaciously Teal www.tteal.org

Tenaciously Teal is a non profit based out of Oklahoma who’s mission is to provide hope by providing cancer patients with gift cards, monthly care packages, brave shave parties, and empowerment shoots. The nonprofit was started by an ovarian cancer survivor named Tarah. While she underwent 16 months of chemotherapy she brought gift packages to other patients to spread joy and remind others God loves them! These are all the things I needed to feel brave as I fought my fight. I was not able to use most of their services because I live in Ohio. I adopted some ideas and used local support and companies to help fill the purpose.

(Please keep in mind no two journeys are the same. Everything wants different kinds of attention. Always ask permission before sharing personal information about loved ones)