WENDY’S EAGLES 2024
On March 3, Dr. Harpham served as captain of Wendy’s Eagles (WE) for her 20th 5-k Dallas Lymphoma Walk. WE 2024 team raised over $20,000, bringing the WE total to over $300,000 for the Lymphoma Research Foundation. The LRF honored her service with the 2024 CHAMPION OF HOPE AWARD. (transcript of Dr. Harpham’s acceptance, below)
Wow. Thank you Fatima. Thank you LRF for this honor. And thank you Leigh for inviting me to join LRF, and not kicking me out me after I said I don’t fundraise. I’m humbled by this Champion of Hope award because, for me, Wendy’s Eagles has been a mission of hope from the start. I’ve used it to promote hope in other patients. Meanwhile, it’s helped me fulfill some of my own hopes.
For the first Lymphomathon, I was 14 years into my survivorship when I drove with my husband and then-15-year-old son, Will, to Fair Park. On that cold, wet day in 2004, I had hope that the festivities would help Will create some happy cancer-related memories to offset the not-happy ones of my going in and out of treatment…and reinforce that even though cancer is always sad, we don’t have to feel sad all the time. I also hoped the crowd would show him how working together with others empowers us to find solutions to big problems.
That first Lymphoma walk fulfilled those hopes. For every Walk since, some combination of my kids has joined me, bringing gaggles of their friends. We’ve created a lot of good memories.…and reinforced the idea that together we can do so much more.
A different hope has been to use Wendy’s Eagles to honor the memories of my co-survivor friends who had paved the way for me, including Ellen Glesby Cohen, one of the co-founders of LRF. Every walk, I’ve fulfilled my hope to keep their spirits alive, using the fluttering ribbons on the flag of names to send a message to heaven, “You’re not forgotten! Your work mattered and continues on!”
I’ve had—and fulfilled—another hope since UTD pre-health students began doing fundraisers for Wendy’s Eagles: hope to encourage students to think about the survivorship side of illness and to care about advocacy.
Lastly, a hope that has helped me ask for donations despite my amost pathological fundraising phobia is hope of thanking in a meaningful way the researchers and clinicians who made my survival possible. They gave me the gifts of surviving to raise my children and welcome their spouses into our family, and the delicious joy of hugging six little children who call me Grammy. With gratitude beyond measure, I have hoped to do my best to support those researchers whose work will give clinicians more tools to save patients. Leading Wendy’s Eagles, WE have raised over $300K.
30 years ago, lymphoma forced me to give up my dream and retire from medicine when I was a young doctor. That’s when I participated in 3 clinical trials that were partially funded by organizations life LRF. After today’s event, I will retire as captain of Wendy’s Eagles. This time, I’m retiring in great health and officially “old” thanks to discoveries made through that research 30 years ago and discoveries since.
I have many people to thank, beginning with my husband and children. You need to know that they would have much preferred to never hear or see the word LYMPHOMA or anything related to cancer—well everyone but Jessie, who as a kid wanted to see my Hickman catheter and scans…and is now a doctor. SO: Ted…Becky and Kyle…Jessie and Benedict…Will and Jorge, thank you for supporting me and Wendy’s Eagles.
A big shoutout to Cindy Ngo, a UTD alum who introduced the Color Run a few years ago...and shoutouts to Leela, Subhaan, and Owais for a great job today. Of course, they and all past officers couldn’t have succeeded in raising so many thousands of dollars without the hundreds of AED and other UTD students who became Wendy’s Eagles over the years. So, to all of you, a Big Whoosh thank you!
I very much want to thank each of my friends by name, some of whom have walked with me since the first Lymphomathon at Fair Park. But to start this Color Run before sunset, I must thank you as a group: Thank you, thank you all!
