Your support is helping women affected by breast cancer now and in the future.
Meet Paula
It was Christmas Day, 2022.
Paula Rizqallah—a 36-year-old business owner, women’s empowerment advocate, mother-of-three and wife—finally had a moment to let her hair down.
She took a mid-afternoon shower that would turn her world upside down.
Meet Melissa
For nearly two decades, Mel Just has seen and heard, first-hand, the lifelong impact of breast cancer. Now, she truly feels it too.
In her diverse and specialised role as a clinical support worker with radiology group Queensland X-Ray, presenting partner of International Women’s Day Fun Run, 38-year-old Mel professionally and compassionately cares for breast cancer patients.
Now, after her own rollercoaster journey with a rare and aggressive breast cancer jolted into gear in August 2022, Mel has a personal and lived experience to add to the mix. It includes a deeper empathy for the women she nurtures, etched from her own battle.
Meet Monique
With an 800-acre cattle property, 20 sheep, two alpacas, five goats, 10 chooks, two dogs and 200 beehives on the way, Monique Perry is no longer the “city girl” she once described herself as.
Together with childhood sweetheart-turn-hubby, Andrew, “a country boy” and builder, Monique is now cocooned by the love of her four children—Julia, Ella, Shania and Alex—and the fresh air of their Anduramba property on the Darling Downs.
The rural setting is proving a healing space for Monique and her family after the horrid diagnosis in 2021 of triple negative breast cancer, an aggressive and fast-growing cancer with a high risk of metastasis and recurrence.
Meet Raelene
Rae Brown and hubby Andy Watson are going to Graceland. Spiritual home of the one and only, Elvis Presley, “the King of rock and roll”.
Their bucket-list trip to the US and Japan will also include visits to Nashville and the National Civil Rights Museum in Memphis.
More significantly, it will enable this inseparable married couple to celebrate an important milestone, as Rae’s breast cancer battle lessens, and she begins to look towards the next phase of her cancer journey with optimism.
Meet Ash
For Mater specialist Breast Cancer Care Nurse, Ash Mondolo, this is personal.
The Sea of Pink that moves to make change at International Women’s Day Fun Run isn’t just a groundswell of anonymous faces. It’s so, so much more than that.
It’s comprised of inspirational women she knows and has cared for on a deep, personal level–her patients fighting breast cancer. They are former, current and future patients. All with the unique, individual and personal fears, hopes, dreams and practicalities that come with each cancer journey for patients and loved ones.
Will you support the 55 women* who are diagnosed with breast cancer every day?
Donate now
*Cancer Australia, 2021
