By Linda Barlow  |  Oct 8, 2013

Profiles in Courage: Beating Breast Cancer One Story at a Time

As we recognize Breast Cancer Awareness Month, heroes, organizations and allies nationwide are leveraging creative strategies to empower patients and families, educate communities and mobilize supporters to overcome the disease and live healthier.

Paul DeMiglio

Paul DeMiglio

Are You Dense?

Dedicated to “informing the public about dense breast tissue and its significance for the early detection of breast cancer” Are You Dense? seeks to educate the public and raise awareness around dense breast tissue and the need for early detection through online tools and resources in addition to speaking engagements. This organization helps women diagnosed with breast cancer by highlighting what it’s like to live with the disease, advocating changes to public policy around detection and supporting new and existing research.

Athena® Warriors

From the time she was a little girl, six-time Grammy winner singer/songwriter Amy Grant knew that cancer “was a force to be reckoned with.” Amy was inspired at a young age by the work of her father – an oncologist who spent his entire medical career treating cancer – to join the band of warriors. A tireless advocate, she draws courage from the countless women she helps empower every day to fight breast cancer, along with her fellow warriors: Amanda Beard, Angela Stanford and Karen Gooding.

“I am inspired by every Athena Warrior. If my music can bring women together and make a connection, then I have contributed something. Athena water takes a terrible situation and does something good for many; that’s why I love being an Athena Warrior,” Grant said.

Terror for Ta-Tas

Woods of Terror — a haunted theme park in Greensboro, North Carolina — hosts the annual “Terror for Ta-Tas Night” to benefit breast cancer survivors. A percentage of the proceeds from this year’s event will be donated to Cone Health Cancer Center’s “Finding your New Normal” program for breast cancer survivors.

Tami Knutson, Breast Cancer Center Manager for Cone Health, is passionate about helping Terror for Ta-Tas because she believes it will empower more Americans to live healthier and bring us closer to ending breast cancer.

“I teach young women about self-breast awareness,” Knutson said. “There is not another venue that I have access to young people.  Most health fairs attract people in the middle years and older. I find teaching  in such a crazy, unexpected location very rewarding. It catches people off guard and I think my message is really heard.”

The Terror for Ta-Tas event runs from 7:30–11 p.m. Friday, October 11. For event information visit terrorfortatas.com, and to learn more about the “Finding Your New Normal” program e-mail Tami Knutson at Tami.Knutson@conehealth.com.

Tough Enough to Wear Pink

A non-profit marketing campaign sponsored by Wrangler, Tough Enough to Wear Pink (TETWP) began with breast cancer survivor Terry Wheatley who, with Wrangler, challenged cowboys and cowgirls to wear pink at the Wrangler National Finals Rodeo to raise awareness and to honor the women in their lives that had been affected by the disease.  TETWP serves as a springboard for communities to create rodeos and other western events that raise awareness around breast cancer.  By focusing attention on women’s health, this initiative raises money for women’s health education, supports women’s treatment centers and much more.

“The success of the Tough Enough to Wear Pink campaign – which has raised over $14.5 million dollars since its inception in 2004 – is that every community that participates through their rodeo or their western event is encouraged to keep their money locally to do good in their own back yards through contributions to their women’s breast cancer center, the women’s breast cancer wing of the local hospital or whatever breast cancer support group is in need in their community,” Wheatley said. “It is the decision of the local rodeo committee or event on who receives their donation.  The success of the campaign is that it is truly grass-roots, with people raising $5 at a time to support someone in their community.”

For example, Red Bluff Round-Up raises money for breast cancer treatment at the St. Elizabeth Imaging Center in their community of Red Bluff, California, to provide mammograms and other women’s health services directly from the funds generated through their TETWP rodeo event. This is just one of the many examples of how individual rodeos and western events use their funds to help women live healthier lives.

Now tell us how you are touching the lives of women living with breast cancer. What are you doing in your local community, place of worship, school or workplace to spread the word about how we can stop this disease together?