Almost five years ago, at the age of 46, I was diagnosed with stage IV ALK-positive non-small cell lung cancer. I was otherwise healthy, with no known risk factors and no family history of lung cancer, so the diagnosis felt impossible. Being told you have stage IV cancer is disorienting in a way that is hard to describe. Plans shrink to the next scan, the next appointment, the next unknown. It is easy to feel helpless, and at times hopeless, when so much of what happens next is out of your hands. What changed that for me was research. New treatments and medical advances have given me time, options, and a kind of hope I did not have at the start. That hope is not abstract. It is the reason I am still here, and the reason this fundraiser matters.
ALK Positive is a patient-founded, patient-driven nonprofit working toward a cure for ALK-positive cancer and toward longer, better lives for people living with it. ALK-positive lung cancer is uncommon, and research aimed specifically at it does not receive enough government funding. Patients, caregivers, and families have filled that gap by raising money and directing it into research. Since 2017, ALK Positive has committed more than $10 million to grants and partnerships with groups such as the Lung Cancer Research Foundation, LUNGevity, GO2 for Lung Cancer, and the American Association for Cancer Research. That funding supports scientists studying why this cancer develops, why treatments stop working, and how to move closer to a cure. Much of it comes from people like us, through personal fundraisers.
My mom, my sister, and I are hosting Cookies for a Cure because we wanted to do something together that feels like us. We love to bake, and a cookie fundraiser is a joyful way to bring our friends, family, and communities into the same room. Sharing something homemade, and knowing the proceeds support ALK Positive research, turns an ordinary afternoon into a way to give other patients the hope that medical advances have given me. This year, that is the kind of gathering we want to host.
We hope you will enjoy the almost 100 varieties of homemade cookies and take a moment to learn more about ALK Positive and the research your support makes possible. Thank you for being here, and for your generosity. It means more than we can say — because life is what you bake it.