Just as my workouts are planned, so is my fundraising and PR. 

This week, my emails will go out. My letters requesting help and donations - any kind of donations - money, sponsorships, materials, time and effort (including just sharing and reposting my crazy facebook and twitter and instagram posts to your friends) .. go out, too. It all happens this week. You've seen me on billboards

You've seen me on the front page

You've seen me on TV

http://youtu.be/VB3lEFdU-qI

You've seen me on street corners

You've seen me speak at events, schools and any place where I can tell my story

You've seen me with celebrities who also share similar struggles with cancer and other "impossible" struggles

http://youtu.be/TOZMSdrcye0

And you've seen me go to to the top to try to make a difference when it comes to treating and curing cancer and similar diseases

You've seen me coordinate other walk/run races to bring awareness and fund colonoscopies for people in my community who cannot afford them so that they have a fighting chance to beat cancer at an early stage

Some of you have shown your own support by wearing a little bit of the love around your neck or wrist or even continuing to show your own love at race events... spreading joy, love and showing everyone that we can all do what we can to be healthier and fitter

You've probably had a little "magic in a cup" a time or two (and yes this local favorite shake really is the best you'll ever have)

You've seen me as an advocate for health and fitness by exposing my own personal health factors and how I involved my team of medical doctors to follow me along in my journey through marathons, triathlons, century rides and now my half-ironman to ensure that everything I'm doing is good for me and within my body's limits.

My point being is that this shy girl has used all the PR and marketing skills she has to promote the cause closest to her heart and is exhausted. I don't want to hide in obscurity (where I actually feel most comfortable) because I'm afraid that the quest for affordable and accessible cancer treatments and the ability to find the causes and cures for cancer will become pushed aside when hot topics of news, entertainment, etc. come around.

Facing the biggest physical challenge, knowing I'm WAY out of my league, at a time when a handful of the haters are most vocal and most people have spent beyond their means on holiday gifts and knowing that the majority of the people who have given already have no more to give and those who have listened/read/followed/joined along have made health and fitness a permanent part of their lives... why in the world would I still be doing this? Why would I continue to put myself through all this pain, ridicule, sacrifice?

Because my Momma cannot run. Because Sissy cannot ride her bike. Because Donny cannot swim. Because Rodney cannot laugh. Because Jana cannot smile. Because Dezma is no longer here.  None of them are. And I am. And I made a promise.

This is not about me. This is not about them. This is about us. All of us. TOGETHER.

So you're going to see me again.... asking for your help and for you to join with me. Come with me now.

https://soundcloud.com/mmmusic/kongos-come-with-me-now

When at first you don't succeed, you try TRI AGAIN

On July 4th 2006 at approximately 4:00 in the afternoon on the deck of a covered porch overlooking the dock on the Laguna Madre at South Padre Island, my mother, my aunt, Janie - my aunt's friend and fishing buddy, and I with my 3-year old in tote sat chit chatting and giggling over current events as the boys, slathered in sun block, relentlessly tossed their fishing lines into the warm murky waters. Momma had retired from working with the Texas Workforce Commission for three decades and had joined my father at his Real Estate office and had landed her first really big commissioned sale. As celebration, she treated the whole family to a holiday weekend at Outdoor Resorts (it's a different name but for those of us who were raised there, it'll always be called that). 

From out of the blue it seemed, all of a sudden, Momma started a conversation about her constipation problems. I know, it's not normal holiday summer vacation conversation... but this was no normal event any way you look at it.

Days later, it was confirmed. Momma was in stage IV of colorectal cancer. 

9 years later, we are now entering the week of July 4th, 2015, and Momma (colorectal cancer), my aunt Sissy (Leukemia), Janie (breast cancer) and Donny (stroke), my brother, are no longer with us on Earth. Exactly nine years ago, all of us were soaking up the sun, fishing, laughing and drinking margaritas on the deck overlooking the sparkling bay of South Padre Island. Never EVER in my wildest nightmares would I have thought we would have gone through something so terrorizing as what cancer did to my family and friends. But it did.

Cancer can take any one of us and our loved ones.

And that's one of the reasons why I continue on this journey... I promised my family I would not stop until there is affordable and accesible treatment for EVERY ONE of us who needs and wants it and that the cause and a cure is found so that cancer can be wiped away from our world. 

I began with a promise to Sissy. And then I kept the promise going in my Mother's honor. And while I ran my first marathon and wanted to quit, a stranger yelled at me. She begged for me not to quit because what I was running for was what has kept her alive. That's when it hit me that countless nameless strangers swam, cycled and ran for my mother and Sissy and their treatments. What they did - all those marathons, triathlons, century rides, hikes, proms, Man & Woman of the year banquets - they all kept her with me for 6 wonderful, cherished, treasured years. I hope I can do this for others.

This is not a sad story of death and pity. This is a journey of hope and healing and that’s why I’m asking you to donate to my TNT fundraising page for TNT!

I was never an athlete (and still don't consider myself one). A few months before I turned 42, I ran my very first mile. I ran my first 5K a month after that. I ran my first 10k a month after that. I ran my first half marathon - LiveSTRONG in Austin - a week before I turned 42, on my brother's birthday - the first of his birthdays that I would experience without him. Two months after that, on Easter Sunday, April 8, 2012, my Momma joined her Lord and Savior. Two months after that, June 2012, I ran my first full marathon, the Rock & Roll marathon in San Diego. I went on to run the Nike Women's Marathon in San Francisco, the R&R San Antonio Marathon, the 172-mile campaign for Vannie Cook Children's Cancer Clinic and the Fiesta marathon all that year. The next year, I ran the Herothon in San Antonio and then entered the world of triathlon with Stanley's Tri in March, 2013 and the Captial of Texas Triathlon in Austin in May of that year. A few months later, I won the LLS Triple Crown (a marathon, triathlon and century ride) by completing a 104-mile cycling challenge up a 5,000 foot mountain in the Nevada summer heat. I hope to top that honor this year with my first half Ironman. 

By participating as a member of The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s (LLS) TNT, I am raising funds to help find cures and ensure access to treatments for blood cancer patients.

Your donation will help fund treatments that save lives every day; like immnuotherapies that use a person’s own immune system to kill cancer. You may not know it, but every single donation helps save a life with breakthrough therapies such as these.

Patients need these cures and they need your support.

Please make a donation in support of my efforts with Team In Training and help get us all closer to a world without blood cancers.

Thank you!