Brayden's Relay for Life & Survivor Dinner

Friday was our first time to participate in the American Cancer Society's Relay for Life events for Rogers/Bentonville. We have signed up Brayden as a survivor and he will do a special walk this Friday at Pinnacle. Bryan is walking on a team for his work in honor and support of Brayden. If you'd like to support his walk and donate to the American Cancer Society, you can click on his page here.

Friday's dinner kicked off with such a neat God hug to us. If the timing hadn't worked just right, we'd missed it. As we were walking in, a sweet teacher who used to teach at Brayden's school was walking over to her window to close it and just happened to see Brayden! She ran out to greet us and it was SO wonderful to see her! We'd missed her this past year and it was so awesome getting to catch up with her and her to see how great Brayden's been doing. She prayed with us and was just such an encouragement to us.

On to the dinner, we felt so uncomfortable and uncertain. They did a lovely job with some sweet volunteers. Finally we saw some familiar faces of another Mom who'd reached out to us in the early days of diagnosis with her 11-yr-old son who'd battled the same diagnosis with relapse & transplant procedures & 6+ yrs of treatment since he was 3. We were SO grateful they were there and sat with us. The boys were adorable as they were digging through their special goody bag you could tell had been hand-packed for the 3 young men who were survivors attending that night. There was another young man of the same age who was a special speaker for that night telling of his Lymphoma diagnosis and his 3-month treatment. After he was finished, the boys ran to the back to meet him in person and share stories. Once this young man heard of Brayden's treatment plan and our sweet friend who was there too going through his own long journey since age 3, he was visibly surprised with imagining the duration of the treatment. I loved getting to see the 3 of them together and this is what I had hoped - that Brayden would be reminded he isn't in this alone and there are others going through the same struggles and others who have come through to the other side!!

A special moment in the night was when Brayden received his Survivor pin, celebrating 2 more birthday's since diagnosis. Brayden also gave me a special Caregiver pin. It was a neat moment and one that seemed so surreal. Brayden was the newest diagnosed male patient in attendance that night.

This Friday we will participate in the Relay for Life walk. Please feel free to come out and join us. Brayden will walk in the Survivor Lap at 7pm, then there will be a Caregiver walk, then we walk for a cure in thanks to the donations that have come in. We're hoping it's not too hot and we have good weather!! It's a great way to honor those who have endured their battle against cancer, honor those who have lost their fight, and work to ensure all those diagnosed have the opportunity to celebrate more birthdays!