Marching To Find A Cure For Cancer

By STEVE KORNACKI The Tampa Tribune

Published: Oct 21, 2007

ST. PETE BEACH - Bobbie Shay Lee had just finished eating lunch during a break in the Tampa Bay Breast Cancer 3-Day walk that covers 60 miles. She looked down at her 3-year-old daughter, Aidyn, and asked, "Why is Mommy here?"

She held Aidyn's hand as the little girl pirouetted in circles and missed her cue to answer. So Mommy did: "Because Mommy is a survivor."

Aidyn giggled and skipped away.

"She's my little miracle," Lee, 35, said Saturday afternoon. "Having chemotherapy affects your fertility. Your whole system is compromised. I wasn't sure if I was going to be able to have kids."

She learned that she had breast cancer at age 25, in her third year as a Tampa Bay Buccaneers cheerleader, and cheered the entire 1998 season despite undergoing two surgeries and seven weeks of radiation.

Lee is among 1,900 walkers expected to exceed last year's total of $4.7 million raised in the area to fight breast cancer. This is the ninth of 12 fundraising walks scheduled across the country from Boston to San Diego.

The walkers started at Sand Key Beach and covered 22 miles Friday before camping at Walter Fuller Park in St. Petersburg.

The group did an 18-mile loop through the beach communities Saturday before returning to Fuller Park, and will conclude today with a 20-mile trek that ends with a victory lap at Spa Beach Park in downtown St. Petersburg.

Encouragement greets the walkers at nearly every stretch of the course. Cars pass honking horns; the Girl Scouts of Troop 662 in Temple Terrace cheered them on while waving orange pompons in St. Pete Beach; and volunteers and relatives encourage them at various cheer section locations.

Kendra Mendoza said all of the encouragement helps push her and other walkers through the course. But a lady standing in a hospital parking lot with a cap over her shaved head was something special.

"She probably just came out after a chemo treatment and was just bawling as she looked at us," said Mendoza, 36, of St. Petersburg.

Dawn Pardo, 37, of St. Pete Beach, added, "She was cheering us and crying."

Mendoza shook her head, saying, "It made us feel good. We didn't cure it, though. We're just walking for it."

Mendoza, Pardo and Ranae Sorensen, 35, of St. Petersburg formed a team referred to on their children's T-shirts as "Busom Buddies." They trained hard and raised $11,000 in pledges, easily exceeding the $2,200 required for each walker to participate.

"I had melanoma and had one year of chemo treatments and it cleared up," Sorensen said. "I figure that if we can cure one cancer, we can raise money to help cure another."

They have walked six or seven miles every Tuesday and Thursday since June. The three women made longer walks on weekends, peaking with 23- and 20-mile tests on a Saturday and Sunday in late September.

Despite the preparation, Sorensen injured her knee and ankle and required athletic taping to continue.

Sarah Klein, 31, of Tampa passed the trio while speed walking toward Upham Beach. She wore a sign on her back in support of Jack Forsting, the husband of a friend and co-worker.

"I want to bring attention to the fact that men get breast cancer, too," Klein said.

She added that today she will wear a sign and photo in support of her friend, Terri Johnson, who has cancer in her spine, pelvis, ribs and pericardium sac around her heart.

They walk for their friends, family and themselves. They walk to help find a cure.

"The support we all receive is overwhelming," said Lee, who walked on a 13-person WTSP, Channel 10, team that included that station's anchors, Heather Van Nest and Reginald Roundtree. "They touch you in every way along the way. They touch your heart and spirit. It gives you goose bumps."

Mendoza, Pardo and Sorensen were greeted at Upham Beach by their husbands and children, whose T-shirts also read: "My Mommy Walked 60 Miles To Save Lives."

Mendoza said, "We hope that one day there is a cure and we won't need a walk for our children and grandchildren."

Reporter Steve Kornacki can be reached at (813) 731-8170 or skornacki@tampatrib.com.