LAWRENCE: 784 walkers at LHS join Relay for Life to fight Cancer

By Lea Kahn
   Susan Dean had all of the classic symptoms of thyroid disease, such as unexplained weight gain and a loss of hair.
   But physician after physician and blood test after blood test could find nothing amiss, Ms. Dean said. And yet she felt intuitively that there was something wrong.
   Just as Ms. Dean was leaving yet another physician’s office, the doctor said she wanted to check Ms. Dean’s neck for the thyroid gland — and to everyone’s surprise, it did not feel normal.
   The Langhorne, Pa., resident had surgery to remove the gland, and a biopsy determined that it was cancerous. Thyroid cancer is rare, but treatable, said Ms. Dean, who is an eight-year cancer survivor.
   Ms. Dean, 46, was surprised to learn that she had cancer — but on the other hand, several family members had died of cancer. Her mother was 55 when she died of cancer and her brother was 28 when he succumbed to cancer.
   ”I do have a genetic issue that puts me at risk for six different cancers,” she said. “The ‘c’ word is a very difficult thing to swallow. It’s something you live with every day. I view my life every single day as a fight to be cancer-free.”
   And that’s what drew Ms. Dean to Friday afternoon’s Relay for Life fundraiser at Lawrence High School. She is married to Michael Dean, who is the Lawrence Township public school district’s technology coordinator.
   The Relay for Life is the American Cancer Society’s key fundraising event. This year, the school district’s Relay for Life event attracted 79 teams and 784 participants. In the two years that the school district has participated, it has raised more than $133,000 — including more than $58,000 this year.
   ”I’m here (at the Relay for Life) in memory of the people who lost their battle,” Ms. Dean said. “Part of it is therapy. I have lost a significant number of family members to cancer. The threat of cancer looms over you. It is a difficult thing.”
   While Ms. Dean and several other cancer survivors and their caregivers enjoyed a special dinner reception inside the Lawrence High School Library, outside there were hundreds of students, faculty, staff and community members who walked laps around part of the high school parking lot.
   The Relay for Life teams had gathered inside the LHS Commons and on the portico outside, waiting for the event to begin at 6 p.m. They brought an assortment of food and set it up on tables inside the Commons, creating a festive atmosphere.
   One banner strung up on the wall proclaimed that “Once you choose hope, anything is possible.” Participants sported T-shirts that identified their team, and Hootie the Owl — the Lawrence Intermediate School mascot — wandered through the crowd.
   ”Let’s get this party started,” said LHS history teacher Mark Rowe, who was the event emcee, as the LHS Red Scare marching band played and Lawrence Middle School Principal Andrew Zuckerman carried a fake torch through the crowd.
   That torch, said Superintendent of Schools Philip Meara, was passed from school to school earlier in the day. A team of students and administrators from each school handed it off to the next one, starting at the Slackwood Elementary School and ending at LHS.
   Mr. Meara introduced Dr. Richard Porwancher and his wife, Donna Porwancher, who WAS/IS a school psychologist. They are among the three trustees of the Josephine Peiser Charitable Foundation, which donated $16,000 to the Friday afternoon event.
   Ms. Peiser, an interior designer who lived in Princeton, died in 2004 after a seven-year battle against breast cancer, said Dr. Porwancher, who was her personal physician. It is most fitting for the foundation to donate money to the Relay for Life, so that “in the broadest sense,” it’s about not giving up the fight, he told the crowd.
   Rebecca Gold, who co-chaired the Relay for Life, thanked the teams for participating, adding that “we cannot do anything without all of you.” Each lap that they walk, she said, “brings us closer to a world with more birthdays” — one of the themes in the fight against cancer.
   Then, as the crowd counted down, school district officials cut the purple ribbon to start the Relay for Life — the first lap led by cancer survivors and their caregivers, and the second and subsequent laps by the teams.