Susan G. Komen 3 Day for the Cure Experience

I originally posted this on my old blog back in 2011 after I completed the Susan G. Komen 3 Day for the Cure. Since I am blogging over here now, I wanted to share my story with all of you. Be prepared, this is a long one!

Fundraising 101:

I think one of the hardest parts of taking on the challenge of the Susan G. Komen 3 Day for the Cure is the fundraising efforts. As a walker, you commit to raising $2,300.00. You read that right; I said twenty-three hundred dollars.  This is no easy task. It takes hard work and dedication to raise this money along with support of amazing family, friends, co-workers, neighbors, etc.  I started off by reaching out to my close friends and family asking for a donation. Any amount that they could give would give me the jump start I needed to get to my goal. After a couple hundred dollars of donations this way, I moved onto can koozies. My teammate and I ordered black koozies with hot pink writing that said “Great Boobs Are Worth Fighting For” on one side and “Las Colinas Girls Gone Miles” on the other. We paid approximately $0.55/koozie and sold them for $5.00 each. I chose not to pay myself back from the koozie sales and put all $5.00 towards the daunting goal I had been challenged with. I quickly sold almost 100 koozies on my own and put in a second order so I was sure to have some left over for our upcoming Casino Night.

One of Patrick’s co-workers’ wives sells Scentsy Wickless Candles and was willing to do a fundraising event for me as well. She donated her commission on the sales of the party, which ranged from 25-30%, and we did an online/catalog party. I didn’t sell as much as I would have hoped and I was the best customer but we raised another $50+ toward my goal.

My teammate and I hosted a Casino Night at The Cellar Restaurant & Bar in Irving/Las Colinas on October 1^st. This event took a lot of planning and hard work to get put together. We rented two black jack tables, one craps, one roulette and one poker table that were paid for by local businesses in return for an advertisement of their logo on the tables. We also asked for donations of prizes from different businesses that were raffled off at the end of the night. After getting the tables and prizes donated, we needed to get people at the event in order to raise the money we needed. We dropped off flyers at local businesses, advertised on Facebook and spent a couple of nights at The Cellar trying to get the word out. Our goal was to raise $3,000.00 the night of the event so we would both meet our goal. We sold koozies, chips and took cash donations. The event was a big success and everyone had a great time! We raised $1,600.00 and The Cellar donated $173.00 (10% of the food sales from that night).

Although it made a huge dent in what we needed to raise, I was still a couple hundred dollars away from meeting my $2,300.00 goal and we had a month left before the event. This is where my last minute pleas came into play. I asked EVERYONE I know for a donation. I harassed my friends & family on Facebook and made phone calls to try and get more donations. I went into the walk needing to raise another $69.00. At the end of day one, I needed another $35.00 to reach my goal and was thankful to an aunt who came through and pushed me over the hill and I was DONE! I met my goal so now all I needed to do was make it through the next two days!

Training:

Susan G. Komen provides you with a schedule for training for 24 weeks before the walk and 16 weeks before the walk, depending on how active you are currently. You can print out a PDF of the schedule or go by the weekly e-mails they send you. It tells you day by day the amount of time you should exercise or miles you would walk, depending on the day. I will be the first to admit that I did train for The 3 Day, but I definitely didn’t walk as much as they recommended. It was difficult to the find the time to walk 8-20 miles on a Saturday & Sunday, plus walks during the week. On top of finding the time, throughout the entire training process, I had problems with my feet and hips. I had dozens of blisters on my heels and during some of the longer walks, my hips would start to lock up on me. Over the summer I went in to RunOn after an 8 mile training walk got fitted for some new shoes. I was hoping this would cure the blister problems. Unfortunately, it didn’t. I continued to get blisters, especially on the back of my right foot in the same spots as before. I tried everything to help. I bought new socks, used glide on my feet, powder to keep them dry, changing my socks half way through the walk, etc. After a couple months of this, I said enough was enough and I took my shoes back to a different location of RunOn. They fitted me for a new pair of shoes and took the original pair back and gave me all of my money back. They told me if I continued to have problems with the new shoes to bring those back and they would try something else. I was also advised that I should be wearing a shoe that is one size larger than what I really am when walking this type of distance. For me, this meant a size 10. I wear a size 9.5 but after measuring my feet, I found out that my left foot is a 9.5 and my right is a 9. I always knew that one foot was bigger than the other but didn’t know it was ½ a size larger! I started training in the new shoes and didn’t have any problems so I went back and bought a second pair because they suggest you have two pairs of shoes for the walk. One pair is for day one and three and the other for day two.

Day 1:

After getting little to no sleep with the anticipation of the weekends’ events, I got up at around 4:30AM to prepare for day one. We had to arrive at the Collin Creek Mall in Plano between 6AM-7AM with the opening ceremony scheduled to start at 7:30AM. It was a very chilly morning but despite that, everyone seemed to be in great spirits. All of the walkers huddled together as the opening ceremony began and the sun began to rise. Walkers & survivors filed off of the stage carrying different flags that show who they are walking for and their hopes for the future. We listened to a woman speak about breast cancer and how it has touched each of our lives. They wrapped up opening ceremony with some music and had us exit as if we were cattle coming out of the pasture and into the barn.

Bags are packed & ready to go!

Opening Ceremony

Opening Ceremony

I was thinking to myself, this is it! This is what I’ve been working towards for MONTHS! It’s all happening right now. Once we were out of the holding area for opening ceremony, we were surrounded by people cheering us on and thanking us for walking. Out of nowhere, I heard my name. It was Jackie, my old Weight Watchers leader. I couldn’t believe my eyes… She had come out to support me! After a quick hug and my eyes welling up with tears, I was back on my way. We left the mall parking lot and headed out with our final destination for the day in mind. We would walk through Plano, Richardson & into Farmer’s Branch where we would stay for the night.

As the sun came up it finally started to warm up and we began to thaw out from the chilly morning and started shedding layers. Layers were the key to trying to stay warm. In total on day one, I was wearing four shirts; a long sleeve under shirt, a short sleeve shirt, a light shirt/jacket & a fleece jacket (I bought the fleece first day because I was freezing before opening ceremony)!  A couple of hours into the walk, I started feeling some “hot spots” on my feet so we took a break at a pit stop to cover them up with some Band-Aids and moleskin to prevent blisters from forming. Once we got to lunch, I realized that I need to the have the medics take a look since my feet were starting to hurt. They covered up my heels to prevent any blisters from forming, dried off my feet, I put some new socks on and away we went. Somewhere around mile 18, my feet were starting to hurt again so I had the medics look at them again. Where the original medic had put the mole skin around my heel, I got a blister from the seam in the bandage. They had to “lance” aka pop my blister, cover it up and sent me back on my way.

Patrick Dropped by for a Quick Hello

The next 2+ miles were pretty uncomfortable. The spot where my blister had been was hurting, my hips were starting to lock up, I had some shooting pain down my right leg and I was ready to be at camp! I toughed it out and made it back to camp around 6:00pm. I was so tired, I just wanted to take a shower, eat dinner and go to sleep!  Unfortunately, these things would have to wait awhile longer. After being up since 4:30AM, having little to no sleep the night before, and walking 20 miles, now we had to find our bags and set up our own tent. At this point, I was very tired and pretty grouchy but had to remind myself who/why I was walking. After the tent was set-up and we got out air mattresses blown up, we went to eat dinner. Finally, we got a hot meal! Throughout the day they provided us with numerous kinds of snacks and a sandwich for lunch but I was definitely looking forward to REAL food! The dinner was just what the doctor ordered. After we finished up, we headed to the showers. At this point the sun had already gone down and it was starting to get cold again. Thankfully the showers were hot and I felt refreshed.

Day 1 is Complete! 20 Miles Down, 40 to Go!

Day 1 is Complete! 20 Miles Down, 40 to Go!

Each night after dinner they had different skits/performances in the dinner tent so after our shower we headed up to the main tent to see what was going on. Our cell phones were running low on battery power so while we watched and chatted with other walkers, we plugged them in for a bit. Lights out is at 9pm so after 30-45 minutes of charging, we headed to our tent to prepare for another long day of walking.

It was freezing cold that night and super windy. Thankfully I had talked with a friend that had walked the year before and listened to her suggestion. She stated that she put hand warmers in her sleeping back to keep her nice and warm all night long. It worked! I was warm until about 5AM when they stopped warming.

We quickly learned the meaning of a “Komen Mile” on day one. They provided us with a schedule each day showing us the mile markers of each of the pit stops, grab and go’s, lunch & camp. According to the schedule, we would walk 17 miles on day one but according to my teammate’s pedometer, we logged just over 20 miles.

Day 2:

We got up at 6AM to prepare for another day of walking. It was REALLY cold outside on Friday night/Saturday morning so the thought of getting out of the tent and into the wind, was less than thrilling. We brushed our teeth, attempted to tame our hair and ate breakfast. Before heading out for the day, we made a pit stop at the medical tent so they could wrap up my feet and take care of the tendonitis in my right knee. The wonderful volunteers that make up the medical team are life savers and a God send. They work diligently to make sure everyone can continue to walk and try to eliminate as much pain as possible. After about 30 minutes, I was ready to head out and tackle the 24 miles that would be day two. Unfortunately, my feet had another plan. At around mile 7 my feet were hurting really bad. I felt like I was walking in pins and needles and didn’t know how much further I could walk. I pushed through for about another mile but eventually realized that I couldn’t continue on this way. I got on one of the sweep vans (15 person vans with crazy decorations that follow the route to pick up people as needed) and headed to the next pit stop. After a 30 minute wait, one of the medics informed me that I had bruised the tendons in the balls of my feet and that if I continued to walk on them, I would get to a point where I couldn’t walk any longer. Although I didn’t want to, I took his advice to stop walking for the day and ice them. While my partner continued walking, I took the SAG bus (large tour bus) to lunch. I ate lunch and hung out while icing my feet for approximately two hours while waiting for her to join me.

While waiting at lunch, there was a lot of commotion and the paramedics were taking a walker off on a stretcher. I was quite confused as to why everyone was cheering her on with a standing ovation until I realized that she was 9 months pregnant and had gone into labor! This amazing woman walked 20 miles on day 1 and 11+ miles on day 2 at 9 months pregnant. WOW! What an inspiration!

After my teammate ate lunch and took off to finish day 2, I headed back to camp to try and rest. I spent the remainder of the day icing my feet, showering and trying to relax. Before bed, I went to visit the medics to have them take care of a few pesky blisters and then headed to bed.  

Day 3:

I was so happy to hear that it was the last day but was exhausted at the thought of another day of walking. Daylights savings time had given us an extra hour of sleep, but we were up and at it at 4:45AM! For those of you who know me, know that I DESPISE getting up early and this was just asinine. We started off by visiting the medics in an attempt to get started on our last day. The line was already out the door of the building so I gave my teammate my spot and figured I would just tape myself up and go try and get ready for the last day. I got into my walking clothes, brushed my teeth and headed back to the tent to start tearing it down. I had to somehow take everything out of the tent and fit it all back into this bag, that is supposed to be under 35#’s! All of this had to be done at 5AM before the sun ever came up that day. After an hour of re-packing, stuffing and zipping, I was finally ready to go eat breakfast and get on our way. We quickly ate our breakfast and got in line for the buses. Unlike day 1 & 2, on day 3, we were bused to the first pit stop to get us closer to our final destination. Unfortunately, there was either a lack of organization or not enough buses because it took us an hour just to get on the bus. So much for waking up early to get a head start, huh?

Williams Park <3

After the bus ride, we arrived at the first pit stop and took off. We needed to try and make up some time because at this point, we were running an hour late. My feet were feeling pretty good for the first mile or two but quickly started hurting again. At the second pit stop, I needed to stop and have my feet re-wrapped. This quickly became a trend the rest of the day with needing to have them looked at and re-wrapped every 3-4 miles. By the time I got the to the last stop before lunch, around mile 11 or 12, my feet were on fire. I honestly didn’t know if I had it in me to finish but I needed to try. I had them re-wrap my feet again and noticed that my toe nails were starting to bruise. I prayed that they could hold out on the rest of the walk because so many others had lost them throughout the walk. The last couple of miles before lunch were pretty tough but we had amazing views. We walked on the Katy Trails around downtown Dallas and eventually ended up right in the heart of Dallas.

Part of the Dallas Skyline

At this point, I was really struggling to keep it together. My feet hurt, I was hungry and I really needed to go to the bathroom. We were at the back of the pack and had to pick up the pace in order to continue walking. At times, I swore we would never make it to lunch. When we finally made it, we had to climb up about a dozen stairs to get to the park. Talk about cruel and unusual punishment for someone who has been walking for the last 2.5 days! I grabbed my lunch and went to sit with some ice on my feet. Finally, my feet got a little bit of relief and it started raining. I just looked up and the sky and thought, “you cannot be serious right now!” I put my shoes back on, grabbed my stuff, put on my poncho and started walking again knowing that the end was near. We only had a couple more miles to go and we would be at the holding area for closing ceremony.

59 Miles Down

Only 1 More Mile!

Slowly but surely I put one foot in front of the next and continued to walk even though my body just wanted to shut down at this point. The last couple of miles were pretty emotional thinking of everything that I had accomplished. We chatted with fellow walkers as we made our way through Deep Ellum and into Fair Park.

Walking into Fair Park

Trying to Keep it Together with all of the Cheers! We are Almost There!

Picking up our Shirts!

Overall Experience:

Throughout each day we passed by schools where children had made signs cheering us on. They had even made up chants to cheer us along and held out their hands to give us a high five. As we passed through different neighborhoods and shopping areas, there were groups of people who take time out of their day to cheer us on. Some wore silly outfits, made funny signs, passed out candy, tissues, water, etc. They ranged in age from newborn babies to one woman who looked like she was in her 80’s. As the miles passed and we grew tired, seeing their smiling faces made it all worth it and reminded us why we were doing this.

Closing Ceremony:

After arriving at Fair Park, we were guided into the holding area. We were greeted by fellow walkers and volunteers who cheered us on as we were entering the building. Since we finished at the end of the pack, we had a few minutes to use the bathroom, get scanned in for the very last time and get our victory shirt. After what seemed like two minutes, they told us we needed to walk to closing ceremony. I kept thinking to myself, I barely made it this far, how can you possibly expect me to walk any further?! Limping the whole way, I made the final stretch of what seemed like 10 miles, probably closer to one, to Gexa Theatre where they held the closing ceremony. As we got closer the walkway was crowded with people cheering us on as we were led towards the stage. After all of the walkers made it, we learned the Dallas/Ft. Worth walk raised over 7 million dollars this year! They gave us more fun facts about what we had accomplished and then invited the crew, medics and the rest of the volunteers to join us in the circle. After they all filed in, we all took off a shoe and raised it into the air as the survivors joined us.

Look at all of Those Shoes!

I don’t think there was a dry eye in the crowd as we showed our love and support and thought of the reasons why we walked. That moment right there, made all of the pain, tears, frustration, hard work, etc. worth it all. It reminded me once again that what I just accomplished is changing lives. Hopefully future generations will not have to worry about cancer taking the lives of their loved ones because we will have found a cure! I've been asked numerous times since the walk if I would do it again. I honestly think that one day I will. I don't plan on walking again next year, but may get involved as a volunteer :-D

My Badge with Most of my Pins