Dear friends and family,
Late last year I was diagnosed with breast cancer. It was an aggressive, fast-moving type that quickly ushered in a whirlwind journey that I hope to bring to a close with my last treatment in May 2024.
As a young woman and athlete with no genetic history or pre-disposing factors, this news was hard to wrap my head around. The day I heard the "C" word, I resolved that I would fight like hell to have the chance to continue to live this "one precious and wild life," in Mary Oliver's words.
I would fight for my beautiful children, for my husband, for my loved ones, for the chance to have a little more impact if I could, and to be able to wake up to see the sun rise over the fields. I am so grateful to have been surrounded by amazing family and friends through the journey – through a bilateral mastectomy, radiation, physical therapy to recover movement, and the path to healing and recovery. Their support has been overwhelming -- thank you to each of you.
When I meditated on beating this thing, I set a goal to hike a big, bad mountain with a bunch of other women who had also fought. And won. And embraced the chance to unwrap the gift of life with a brand new intention and a boatload of gratitude. Coming back from cancer is a physical, emotional, and spiritual journey, and for me, all three converge on a mountaintop.
The time to climb that mountain has come.
I ask your support to help me turn my journey into something that helps others, and humbly ask that you support this quest to raise money for breast cancer research. I will be able to climb this mountain because of top notch medical care and the advances in research, medicine, and treatment in the past decades. It is personally meaningful to me to give the gift of life to other mothers, daughters, and remarkable women. Not all are as fortunate as me.
Your donation today helps me reach our team's climb goal of $30,000. And 100% of the money raised goes directly to cancer research.
Since 1995, Expedition Inspiration has funded over $1,830,225 in research grants. This money goes directly into the hands of those working to find a cure. In 2023, EI funded a $25,000 grant to Dr. Andi Cani from the University of Michigan whose novel research on metastatic tumor cells is truly groundbreaking.
I appreciate your love, support, and enthusiasm as I work hard to get to the summit of Hyndman Peak.
Thank you again to those who have been by my side, and thank you to those who will donate to make a difference. I will carry your love and support with me on the climb, and fly a prayer flag with your name on it at the summit.
If I can be of help or friendship to anyone else on this journey, please connect us.
With deep gratitude,
Kate
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(A friend and fellow breast cancer warrior shared this poem with me. I resonate deeply with how the writer has captured the experience, so I'd like to share it here.)
Untouchable Essence, by Laura Weaver
There is a place within that cannot be destroyed
by flood or fire, by bloodthirsty armies or devastating illness—
it this untouchable essence of us that quakes
with irrepressible light and bears the
intolerable weight of all that must be felt to awaken.
When I first remembered myself after surgery,
my own name strange, both of my breasts removed—
I did not feel loss nor grief,
but a love so ferocious it rolled through me like thunder,
bringing healing rain.
After that, came a knowing of my own wholeness
beyond any story, beyond any dismemberment—
this revelation of our luminous body
that remains intact in spite of all of our sacred shatterings.
And yes, now the landscape is unrecognizable—
yes, now, there is no old path to go back to—
yes, now there is the quivering arrow of this moment
piercing the heart—
the illusion of invulnerability stripped away,
laid bare to this truth.
And so it is. And so we are.
Before I came to this life,
I was shown this world from the distant shores of it—
and in that moment, I saw the full arc of my days here,
the exquisite range of this embodied dreaming.
Oh how beautiful, I cried.
Oh how terrible.
Oh—This terrible beauty.
And the angel who guided me simply pointed and nodded, and said—Yes.