Lancaster’s 21st Relay for Life begins Friday with a celebration as 200 cancer survivors walk the first lap around the track at Lancaster High School’s Memorial Stadium. Loved ones and supporters will then take over and walk laps nonstop the rest of the night to honor loved ones battling cancer or remember someone who lost the fight.
But that first lap is their lap. Survivors walk silently side-by-side in this annual pilgrimage with the unspoken support that can only come from those fighting the same battle. The track is a circle around 59 team tents, filled with their caregivers championing them on. Around they go, like the hands on a clock, grateful for another minute of time.
More than 500 people began working on this special night last November. They met monthly, formed teams and shared fundraising tips. Lancaster is over halfway toward its goal of $143,000 and should easily exceed it with onsite fundraising.
Lots of people with lots of reasons walk laps in this fight. Out of a thousand possible stories, these three shaped and inspired a circle of support that continues with each Relay:
◆ A little girl’s fight with leukemia 21 years ago inspired a hairdresser to join the fight and rally every single year since.
◆ Parents withhold heartbreaking news during Christmas so their 16-year-old daughter can enjoy the holiday burden-free.
◆ A cancer survivor watches her son take chemo on his 21st birthday.
Child’s fight inspires Crenshaw“I don’t know a soul who has not been touched in some way by cancer. At least once a week, one of my clients will mention someone who was just diagnosed with cancer,” said Debbie Crenshaw, Relay’s corporate sponsorship chair.
Crenshaw, owner of Mane Street Hair Designers, has been a major part of Lancaster’s Relay since it began in 1995.
Her job as a hairdresser keeps her in touch with what’s going on in the lives of her clients, who are more like friends.
Twenty-one years ago she was fixing Joy Hayes’ hair and getting an update on how Hayes’ 6-year-old daughter, Blair, was doing.
“The leukemia has come back,” Hayes told Crenshaw.
Blair was first diagnosed at the age of 2 1/2 with an aggressive form of childhood leukemia. Blair had been battling a lingering case of bronchitis. Hayes took her to the doctor to find out why her little girl wasn’t getting well. Bloodwork revealed her platelets were so low that she was in danger of bleeding to death internally. Blair was rushed from the doctor’s office to the hospital by ambulance.
Chemo and radiation were successful and Blair enjoyed a three-year remission. She was about to turn 6 when the leukemia returned.
Blair Cauthen was the initial inspiration for Crenshaw to work so hard in the fight against cancer. Chemo and a bone marrow transplant resulted in another remission lasting until Blair was 14. Then it was another round of chemo, radiation and a bone marrow transplant.
“She was really, really sick that time,” Hayes said.
“My mom took care of me and was always there, a strong person I could rely on. It was hard on me, but probably worse on her to watch her kid go through that,” Cauthen said.
She graduated with her class from Lancaster High School in 2006, due in large part to her grandmother, Lou Hayes, a high school teacher who homeschooled her when she was too sick to attend school.
“I matured a lot faster than most of my friends. Going through that is more than a lot of people go through in a lifetime,” Cauthen said. “I don’t take anything for granted. You appreciate the small things like going to class every day,” which is something that most of her peers dreaded.
Cauthen earned a master’s degree in sports and entertainment management from the University of South Carolina in 2011. She now works for her alma mater as senior director of premium seating and events. Cauthen, 27, has been in remission for 13 years.
Cauthen and her mom will attend this year’s Relay together. She will also hang out at Crenshaw’s tent and reconnect. Cauthen said she enjoys a special relationship with Crenshaw and has been to every Relay since she was 6. During her elementary and middle school years, she helped Crenshaw sell luminaries and place Relay for Life signs in front of businesses that donated money. And one year Cauthen was the team captain for Crenshaw’s team.
“Debbie is so passionate and such a strong advocate for the fight against cancer,” Cauthen said.
Crenshaw laughed as she recalled her first Relay team back in 1995.
“We were clueless as to what to do, but we knew we wanted to help. We rolled a makeup cart out there and a paraffin wax for hand dips and raised $350,” she said.
Crenshaw’s team this year, Relay Rally Cats, has raised over $10,000. One year, they raised $25,000.
Chemo for his birthdayDustin Carnes celebrated his 21st birthday with chemo running through his veins in a fight for his life. Diagnosed with Hodgkin’s lymphoma in August 2010, he underwent chemo for seven months.
His mother, Paula Carnes, a cancer survivor herself, rallied behind him.
“My mom was with me the whole way through and sat by my side during hours and hours of chemo,” Dustin said.
Paula said her son seemed perfectly healthy when he was diagnosed.
“He was a rough-and-tumble young man and didn’t look sick at all,” she said. Dustin worked with his father and grandfather in the family plumbing and heating business.
His mother now leads a Relay team of 38 in his honor. She started Team Dustin Carnes the year he was diagnosed. In its fifth year now, the Carnes team is one of the county’s top fundraising teams.
“We’ve been fundraising like crazy,” Paula said. “Kellie Mosley, my co-captain has helped us so much.”
The team’s fundraising goal was $2,000 and it has already exceeded $10,000.
The team will hold a birthday party at their tent to celebrate Dustin Carnes’ fifth cancer-free birthday.
Cancer unhappy Christmas surpriseMelonie Lyles just celebrated her 40th birthday.
She was faced with the battle of her life at 16 when she discovered two knots on her neck while in class at school just before the Christmas break.
A trip to the doctor for a biopsy left her parents with the hard news that their youngest daughter had Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
Her mom, Janice Watts, said she and Melonie’s dad, Jim, withheld the information until after Christmas Day so Melonie could enjoy the holiday.
“Watching her open presents was excruciating. She looked like the picture of health. It was breaking our hearts,” Janice said. “Her dad and I were petrified.”
Melonie, a cheerleader for the Bruins, went through six months of chemo and radiation and lost her hair at an age when girls spend hours in front of a mirror styling their hair. She opted for sporty hats and bandanas instead of a wig.
She graduated from Lancaster High School in 1994 and went to nursing school, inspired by the compassion she found during her treatment. Melonie now works at Travelers in Charlotte as an insurance medical case manager.
“I hate it happened, but it made me who I am,” she said.
Melonie has been married for 14 years to Adam Lyles and has two active daughters, Averi and Abigail, who are 11 and 12.
“Relay for Life was very emotional the first time I attended because I was still in active treatment. I was a survivor, a fighting survivor,” she said.
“Overall it’s fun, but then (there’s) the silence of the survivors’ lap and the luminaries for those who have not won the battle. I feel so grateful to be alive,” Melonie said.
“Once in the Relay family, always in the Relay family,” she said.
Local fundraising doubles
“Lancaster has an excellent committee of very good people with top-notch volunteers,” Relay for Life community manager Kaleb Keefe said. “They are ahead of their goal.”
At the end of March 2015, Lancaster had raised $31,000. By the end of March this year, the total was $67,000, Keefe said.
The original Relay began in 1985 in Tacoma, Wash. Dr. Gordon Klatt, a colorectal surgeon, walked laps on a track, asking friends to pay $25 to walk with him for 30 minutes. In 24 hours, he had raised $27,000.
Each Relay takes on the unique qualities of its community, but they all have a survivors’ meal, a survivors’ lap, an opening lap with all participants taking a lap around the track, a luminary ceremony, a closing ceremony and a “fight back” ceremony.
Funds raised go to research, prevention groups, community and patient support groups, detection and treatment programs, fundraising and contraction of Hope Lodges.
Relay, the largest fundraiser for the American Cancer Society, is held in over 5,000 communities in the United Sates and around the world.
Gates at the Lancaster Relay will open at 5:30 p.m. Friday.
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