Avon Walk for Breast Cancer

What a challenging and emotional weekend it was. On Saturday and Sunday I walked almost 40 miles through Boston and the surrounding areas (in the rain) for the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer. I never thought walking could be so hard, but boy was it.

Here we are starting out (I'm on the left):

Look at all those people walking...there were 2800 of us:

The first day we started out walking and by mile 10 or so my ankle was killing me…I had to keep going though. At the half way mark (13.1 miles) I had to get some blisters repaired in the medical tent. Thankfully there were rest stops every 2-3 miles with water, snacks, and medical if we needed it. There were a bunch of guys with motorcycles that volunteered....they would be at major intersections to direct traffic, then they'd ride on to their next post so we saw them all day. They were so cool and encouraging!

Here's one of their decorated bikes:

And here we are with them at the end:

With no mile markers it was really tough because it seemed like we were walking so much further than they told us. I couldn’t believe when I had finished the 26.2 miles on Saturday and finally made it to camp, it was exhausting!! But we still had to set up our tent! And I thought sleeping in the tent was going to be uncomfortable, but let me tell you, I could’ve slept under rock and probably have been comfortable…all I really wanted to do was sleep.

A view of camp:

The next morning we still had 13.1 miles to go, but I had to get some blisters taken care of before we set out. The guy in the medical tent told me he was going to have to lance one of my blisters…yikes!!! Actually it wasn’t as bad as I thought and it relieved a lot of pressure so I could walk a little more comfortably. I can’t believe I made it the second day since I was so exhausted and hurting! When we were walking back to UMASS Boston and I could finally see the end in sight I got really emotional and couldn’t believe I was almost done. When we got towards the end my friend that I was walking with and I were the only two in sight at that point….there were people far ahead and behind us, so it felt like just the two of us. There was a team called Men with Heart wearing their yellow shirts standing on either side of the walk cheering us on:

They were so awesome all weekend, and just seeing them there at the end was so encouraging. We then walked up a small hill to this grassy area under some trees and there were tons of people on either side of us cheering us on saying what a good job we did and yea we did it! I started crying at that point, all of the people were so supportive and since it was only the two of us at that point it felt like they were there for us! Hehe!

Here we are, all done and so happy:

The closing ceremonies were very emotional. A woman told us her story and how she is a three year survivor!! Good for her! And then some of the breast cancer survivors who walked went on stage so we could acknowledge them. It was amazing to see those women up there and made me feel great about participating in the whole weekend. All together we raised $6.8 million in Boston to go directly to different organizations (I helped my raising $1800…yea!).

Presenting checks at the closing ceremonies:

It was an amazing weekend that I’m so glad I got to take part in....I would suggest anyone who has a walk in their area to take part in it...its really a cool experience and you are doing something amazing to help fight a horrible disease.