Let’s put and end to the cancer narrative

Have you ever woken up and what you thought would be a good day turned out to be the worst day of your life? This is me 3 years ago. I grew up with an absent father, one who did not care whether you ate or slept on the street or whether I even went to school. One who did not care to look at my school grades or even bother to ask how school went. But despite all that, I have to say that my grandfather was my father figure. Doing all that a father was meant to do. He was my pillar of strength. The man who could take his time to help me out with my homework, ask me how school was and could not fail to notice when I was in a foul mood.

Then one day, in the cold month of June 2015, all this changed. My once jovial, full of life friend. The love of my life was diagnosed with stage 4 lung cancer, with the doctors giving him at most 6 months to live. This broke my heart, but not as much as it broke his. He was put on heavy chemo’ drugs just to try and manage the cancer, but this was too much for him to bear at the age of 80 and as many people his age would do, he gave up the fight. He died on the 25th of October 2015 and life has not been the same for me since then. I miss him everyday. I think of him on a daily basis and I can’t help but think of how proud of me he would be if he were alive and it breaks my heart that he is not here to see me turn into the lady he always wanted me to be.

I know most, if not all of you have lost a loved one to cancer, or know of a close friend who is currently going through the fight and you have to agree with me that cancer SUCKS. Yes I had to put that in capital letters.

The good news is that there is so much we can do to ensure that this beast leaves us alone and goes back to wherever it came from. We could create cancer awareness,be there for the fighters and help in advocating for better policies, but we can’t do all this at once.

That is why you should join in on the 12th of May as we take our first steps towards a cancer free African generation, during our event dubbed “Walk the Talk.” Come walk for you mum, dad, sister, brother, neighbor. I am walking for my grandpa. Who are you walking for? Find your reason and come let’s walk  towards ending this epidemic.

Dial *229*88# for tickets. All the proceeds will go towards refurbishing cancer wards in level 5 hospitals to improve the quality of life for our #cancersoldiers.

Adults : Ksh. 1000

Students: Ksh. 800

Kids below 12 yrs: Ksh. 500.

See you there.