Breast Cancer’s Beaten Path

When Tonya Farriel (at right in photo) was giving up on fighting breast cancer, Jacqueline Roberts helped her pick up her daughter — and resume the battle.

Today Farriel and Roberts are among the ranks of the ​“survivors,” people who beat breast cancer. They joined hundreds of people at Lighthouse Point Park Sunday to raise awareness of the disease they conquered.

Pink and white balloons and banners waved in the brisk winds at the park for New Haven’s first annual Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walk, held to coincide with national Breast Cancer Awareness Month, October.

Women wore pink sashes reading ​“survivor.” Men and women of all ages accumulated in the chilly park with T‑shirts bearing the photos of lost ones. Some shirts and bumper sticker even brought a lighter-note to the event with such messages as ​“Save the Ta-Ta’s” and ​“Beep for Boobies.” Small banners were scattered throughout the park with messages like ​“Women over 40 should have yearly mammograms.”

An estimated 2,600 Connecticut women are diagnosed with the disease each year.

Survivors Roberts and Farriel continue to support each other. ​“The first thing you think is, ​‘I’m gonna die,” said Roberts, a 10-year survivor.’” Roberts is the first generation in her family to have cancer. With prayer from family and friends, she said, she believes that God saw her through. During her fight with cancer, Roberts began volunteering with the American Cancer Society. That later led her to start her own foundation in 2000: Nubian Sisters Cancer Support Group. (Click here and here for more information.)

Through the foundation Roberts met Farriel. ​“This woman saved my life,” said Farriel, a three-year survivor, with tears welling in her eyes. Farriel had given up hope and for two weeks stopped taking medication and going to doctor appointments. ​“I was throwing up a lot, and I couldn’t pick my daughter, Christina [seven years old at the time]. Jacqueline would pick her up for me and wouldn’t allow me to give up.” (Christine is pictured between Roberts and Tonya Farriel in the photo at the top of this story.)

Other participants in Sunday’s walk included Hamden High’s Cheerleading Squad. The ladies normally in green and yellow were dressed in pink and white clothing. They shook pink pom-poms to cheer on walkers at the start-off point. Like many other Americans, the squad lost someone who was dear to them, when Hamden Councilwoman Linda White Epps lost her 11-year fight with breast cancer in 2003. Epps was a big supporter of the cheerleading squad and good friends with their head coach. Epps also started the Sister’s Journey Support Group for women of color surviving breast cancer.

Rick Scavetta of the Hospital of St. Raphael told of the launch of the new Women’s Center for Breast Health at the hospital. The center provides surgery, oncology radiology, pathology, radiation oncology, counseling and support services, genetic screening and etc. The center provides opinions from several different doctors so that patients can have a variety of solutions. ​“It helps soothe patients by giving them relationship with their doctors,” Scavetta said, ​“and the variety of solutions helps because one is forced to only have the choice of surgery It’s a ​‘multi-disciplinary approach.”

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