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Thursday, June 12, 2008

The Countdown to Relay: Dylan


Relay For Life of Tacoma, May 2008

Little Dylan Walsh, the cancer survivor in the purple shirt...surrounded by teammates and Robin's son, Tanner...

He has grown so much since he was diagnosed in 2002...one of my favorite joys during the survivor lap is to see his bright, smiling face that gets older each year. :)

His grandparents, Bob and Joyce, have been such a gift to me over the years. I quote Bob all the time at Relay events...early on when I was volunteering, he impressed the significance of this difference: being committed vs. being involved.

My impression of his lesson?

Being merely involved means showing up on the day of Relay. Thinking it about one period of 24 hours during the year.

Being committed means day in and day out...just as those with cancer face their struggle each day, so we should be committed in our resolve to fund and find the cure. It doesn't start at Relay...it ends at Relay. A culmination of the year's work...and then looking ahead to the next year.

This is the Friends and Family of Soundview Mortgage's 17th year Relaying.

Excerpted the News Tribune article I wrote in 2005...

Friends and Family of Soundview Mortgage have Relayed for 14 years.

Never did they imagine that cancer would find their littlest team member.

Dylan walked his first survivors’ lap in 2004 as a cancer-free survivor. A diagnosis of Burkitt’s lymphoma in 1992 would have given him a 5% survival rate. Thanks to research, his 2002 diagnosis gave him a 75% chance of survival.

Today he is a healthy, happy four-year-old. Proud grandparents and team captains, Bob and Joyce Walsh reflect, “What if there wasn’t an American Cancer Society and no Relay For Life? Nothing would have been done!”

Truer words have never been spoken.

4 comments:

Randy, Robin, Tyler and Tanner said...

I love that picture!

Anonymous said...

Please, please submit your photos for the GW Photo Contest again this year....submit them all!!!!

You are a such a gifted photographer. You manage to capture the feeling of Relay in your photos, which is hard to do since Relay is such a big event. Many people are tempted to take wide shots of big things at Relay that lose focus, but you always manage to capture the emotion of the event in small things...your photos are perfect for ACS promotional materials, so please submit them!!! :-)

And I loved this story...it was really cool to read the survival rate change in only 10 years from 1992-2002. Amazing!

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