What You Can Do with an Extra 24 Hours This Month?

Life is busy, and it’s easy to wish for a few extra hours in the day. We all could probably use extra time to get work done, or sleep a little longer, or spend some quality time with the people we love. Guess what? This weekend, you get that extra time! In fact, you get a whole extra DAY!

2020 is a Leap Year, meaning that Saturday is an additional day to make moves and make a difference in the fight against breast cancer. February 29 only comes around every four years, so let’s make the most of this time. There’s so much fun you can have in 24 hours! Here are just a few of our ideas…

Take a leap! We really want to take advantage of Leap Day! On February 29, we will be getting our 3-Day family together to launch the start of the 3-Day season nationwide. We know our community is spread all across the country, so we will be hosting gatherings in 12 different spots, and on social media.

Join us at one of our “Leaping into the 3-Day 2020” celebrations! Spend some quality time with your 3-Day family. We’ll also have fun activities, broadcast on Facebook and Instagram Live, and much more! Don’t miss this celebration. You can find the locations and more details HERE. If you can’t attend one of yours, host your own using this Host Guide.

Rest up: You might feel some pressure to get an extra few things done while we have this Leap Day on the calendar. But, don’t start your day off stressed! You have a whole 24 hours to do something special so start the day by getting a few more ZZZ’s than usual. Wake up well-rested and ready to Leap Into the 3-Day with us!

Get outside: Schedule a training walk or other work out with your friends and teammates. That will get you moving and grooving through the day right off the bat!

Make 3-Day strides: You can also use the afternoon to work on fundraising and teambuilding. We have some unique ideas for ways to take both your fundraising and teambuilding to really make the most of the weekend weather (hopefully filled with sunshine!) on the blog:

Connect with your coaches: They’d love to hear from you! Many of the coaches will be hosting our “Leaping into the 3-Day 2020” celebrations across the country, so touch base with them and see if you could have the opportunity to meet them in person. You can also always reach out to them on social media as well. They’re here to be your resource and help you make the most of your 3-Day journey. Connect with them on Facebook and follow along for updates:

Relax and Unwind: After having a productive Saturday, that means you can take it slow on Sunday! It’s time to put those feet up and give yourself a rest. Prepare for the week and the new month ahead by acknowledging all that you have done with your Leap Day and in 2020 so far. All of your work and dedication to the 3-Day is already making a difference in the lives of those who need it most. Monday will be a new day, and you’re going to be prepared to take it by storm!

How are you taking advantage of Leap Day? Tell us in the comments to share your ideas! Plus, don’t forget to tag us or use #The3Day if you post photos from one of our “Leaping into the 3-Day 2020” celebrations across the country! Let’s make the most of today, together. ?

What the 3-Day Team Loves MOST

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Valentine’s Day is here! That means it is a time of love and appreciation and happiness…and that doesn’t have to be only about romance. We feel SO much love throughout the year from 3-Day friends and family. That love is based in support and shared commitment, teamwork and inspiration, much of which is gained during our 60-mile journey over our 3-Day weekends throughout the year.

There is plenty of love thrown around during our time together on the 3-Day. To give you a little taste of that love during this chilly winter season, our 3-Day team is sharing what they love most about the 3-Day…and all of you!

Coach Tisho

I love the community. I have participated in a lot of other events and walks over the years and there’s no other community like ours. We call the 3-Day a FAMILY for a reason!

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Coach Molly

Hands down what I love most about the 3-Day is the people who make up our amazing community. From walkers to crew to volunteers to the staff, vendors, partners, and even the strangers who come out and cheer along the route. We are so fortunate to be surrounded by so many people who are working to make the world a better place.

Stephanie from Susan G. Komen

The thing I love most about the 3-Day is that feeling you get on Sunday after the Closing Ceremony. It’s like graduation! You get to see everyone with their old and new friends, family and loved ones. It’s fun to see everyone so rightfully proud of what they’ve done.

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Coach Gayla

I love the moments before the Opening Ceremony when people start arriving and they’re reuniting for the first time since last year’s 3-Day. There’s so much excitement!

Coach Amy

The 3-Day is a 60-mile-long journey, but it is also a journey of the heart. Filled with love, kindness and pure magic. On the 3-Day, you are overwhelmed and empowered in the most positive ways imaginable. You experience something that defies explanation. You are challenged, inspired, pushed harder and appreciated more than you have before. It is a magical thing and I wish I could bottle up this love and sprinkle it all year long!

Coach Staci

What do I love most about the 3-Day? It’s simple: The people!

The participants, my co-workers — we are all working together to make the world a better place.

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Coach Heather

I just love how I feel when I’m at the 3-Day! The energy, love, support, compassion, sense of family…it really takes me to another level mentally! It’s a good place to spend three days!

 

What do you love most about the 3-Day? Tell us in the comments or share this post on your Facebook page and share your reasons there. We love hearing from you!

Happy Valentine’s Day from our 3-Day team to you and your family! We hope your day is full of warmth, kindness and everything you love.

Coach Heather’s Mom is One in a Million. She’s Also One in Eight.

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As we approach Mother’s Day, we have a special guest post from Coach Heather, sharing her own family’s breast cancer story. This year, her mom will be celebrating Mother’s Day for the first time as a breast cancer survivor, and Coach Heather is sharing their journey together to remind us all the ways breast cancer can affect any one of us. We all think our moms are one in a million, but when they also become 1 in 8, everything changes.

 

Truly, never did I think that the 1 in 8 would be my mom. There has been zero history of breast cancer in our family. But sure enough, on the afternoon of February 18, 2019, she received the call with me by her side. I didn’t even have to ask…because I already knew. I could tell by the expression on her face. She had breast cancer.

The call came five days after her annual mammogram. In those five days she had two mammograms, an ultrasound, and a biopsy. They weren’t messing around…bam, bam, bam. This was all taking place in the hospital where she spent 37 years of her career and she had her “people” all around her.

Even after the call, we were in shock. Wait, what? Breast cancer? She had had no symptoms, no lumps, nothing that would ever concern her or lead her to believe she was at risk. She immediately started looking to blame this on something that she had done. Maybe she drank too much wine, maybe she consumed too much caffeine. She needed an explanation.

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Now, after some of the dust has settled, she is far more educated and realized that regardless of whether there were symptoms or not, she WAS at risk merely because she was aging, and because she was a woman. Sometimes, there is no explanation or logic.

The day after she heard her diagnosis, she left for a scheduled vacation. While I had the opportunity for the news to sink in and the chance to be angry, sad, and feel the roller coaster of emotions, she had to remain calm and cool because she didn’t want to put a damper on the vacation for those she was with. At least until she came home.

One week later we had a 3-hour appointment at the Cancer Center at Henry Ford Hospital in Macomb. We were so nervous, knowing that once this train left the station, it was rolling and there was no going back to life “before cancer.”

So, like we do in most situations, we walked through those doors optimistic, joking, and ready to tackle whatever came next. We met a wonderful surgeon who really laid it all out there. My mom had invasive ductile carcinoma, Stage 1, with a tumor smaller than a pea. A lumpectomy was discussed and the treatment plan that the surgeon, oncologist, and radiation oncologist laid out was far better than we originally thought.  The surgeon said “We caught this early. You are not going to die from breast cancer!”

Cue the BIG sigh of relief! But Mom still had so much ahead of her.

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The next week we walked back into Henry Ford for what Mom kept calling “three procedures.” We arrived at 8:30am for her 12:30pm lumpectomy. Prior to the actual lumpectomy, she had wires inserted to act as a roadmap for the surgeon, took a quick trip to nuclear medicine where she had dye injected into her nipple to further direct the surgeon to the location of the tumor, and then finally went into surgery. It went as well as it could go, and we were on our way back home by 3pm.  Mom felt great by 5:00pm, ready to eat Chinese food, and only needed two Aleve per day for the next few days. She was very lucky, and we knew that.

Outside of the breast cancer diagnosis, things have gone as well as they can for someone dealing with this life changing news and journey. About a week after the lumpectomy, Mom’s biopsy results came back with clean margins and no trace in the lymph nodes. Great news! Oncology testing results showed that chemo would not be necessary. So, a month of radiation and then five years of medication would be coming next.

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My mom is all about positivity but still knows that her life will never be the same. The days of reading breast cancer books, really “hearing” commercials related to breast cancer, checking labels for soy, and frowning on the red wine she used to love, are the new normal now. She doesn’t want to do anything to contribute to the development of another estrogen-induced tumor.

To say she is and was scared is an understatement. But much good has come of this as well. She is far more concerned about taking care of herself in regards what she consumes, her exercise regimen, and health in general from this point forward. She is also determined to share her story in hopes that her friends will understand the risks, re-evaluate their daily behavior, and (most importantly!) get their annual mammogram. As we always hear, and as Mom has learned, early detection is key.

I am part of a group of 9 women who have been friends since high school and in recent years, as we rapidly approach 50, I often wondered who would be the 1 in 8 to get breast cancer. Knowing the statistic that 1 in 8 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer, I was prepared that surely it would be at least 1 of us. I just never thought it would be my mom. But breast cancer can affect any and all of us. Now she’s not just one in a million. She’s also 1 in 8, and she is never going to quit.