Posted on Sunday, October 29, 2017

The Lola Brown Foundation Continues to Make Strides Against Breast Cancer!

Hello World,

As today is the last Sunday of the month, I could not let the month go by without mentioning that October is National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I lost two line sisters to this hideous disease so I feel compelled to participate in this advocacy. Unfortunately, I missed walking in the annual Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk this year as I and many others who loved Lola Brown, one of those line sisters who passed away, do every year. However, I do want to highlight the work of The Lola Brown Foundation, which was founded by her best friend Jennifer Phillips in her honor. Below is a video in which Lola shares about her passion for breast cancer awareness followed by her bio:

Lola Brown, a native of Denver, Colorado grew up in Columbia, South Carolina. She attended Richland Northeast High School. While in school, she received honors to attend the South Carolina Governor’s School for academics and was named to the South Carolina All-State Band. You could also find Lola on the court scrambling for digs for the volleyball team or shooting hoops with her varsity basketball teammates.

She graduated from Richland Northeast High School with honors and received a music scholarship to attend the University of Georgia. While at UGA, she joined Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. where she participated in various community service activities. Lola was talented and musically gifted. She was an accomplished pianist and a faithful Christian. She served as an active member of First Northeast Baptist Church in Columbia, SC for several years where she played the piano and directed choirs.

Lola, began her professional career as a financial specialist in the banking industry, was promoted to portfolio manager, and later branch manager. In 2003, at the age of 28 years old, Lola discovered a lump in her breast as she conducted a breast-self exam. Doctors diagnosed her with breast cancer. She was a newlywed to Gilbert Jamal Brown and a new mother to a toddler, Gilbert Jamal Brown II, affectionately known as Gil.

Despite surgeries and years of chemotherapy, Lola continued to fight. She worked throughout her treatment and emphasized the importance of a healthy diet and exercise. During her spare time she worked as an aerobics instructor. She exemplified the true meaning of strength and courage and inspired others to embrace fitness.

Because of Lola’s generous spirit, passion to help find a cure, and desire to promote awareness about breast cancer to young women, she put together a team of family and friends. Through the years those teams raised more than $10,000 for cancer research, for survivors, and for those she called victors. In Oct. 2013, at 38 years old, Lola became one of the victors.

Below are some of the highlights of the foundation’s work to date:

As a celebration of her legacy, the South Carolina House of Representatives has recognized Lola Brown and the foundation’s efforts and named October 23, 2017, the official Lola Brown Breast Self-Check Day in the state of South Carolina. Since Lola was diagnosed at 28 years old, Lola stressed the importance of early detection and breast self-exams and wanted to educate young women that they too could be diagnosed with breast cancer even under the age of 40. In honor of her push for awareness, The LBF is currently working with South Carolina lawmakers and school districts to educate high school seniors on the importance of breast self-exams. The goal is to have a certified health professional talk to students about breast self-exams and breast cancer. Those students can only participate in the 30 to 45 minute session if they have signed parental/guardian consent forms.

The LBF Scholarship for high school seniors –

Jennifer Phillips and LBF Scholar….

Pampered Pink – The LBF will identify those in need based on financial, or medical hardship through breast cancer organizations and support groups. Once identified, The LBF will pamper and assist women between the ages of 18 to 40 who are affected by breast cancer by donating a Pampered Pink spa gift certificate.

I usually make my donation to the American Cancer Society on behalf of breast cancer awareness during the month of October, but I missed doing so this year as I was out of town. However, this year, to support The Lola Brown Foundation, I will be making my donation to the foundation and you can too by clicking on this Paypal link! Although October will be over in a few days, the foundation’s work continues throughout the year so please consider The Lola Brown Foundation as you give to charitable organizations.

Any thoughts?

Posted on Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Mother & Daughter Survivors Treated for Breast Cancer One Year Apart, Inspired By Deceased Relative’s Fight…

Keisha Pooler, her mother Mary Marshall and Keisha’s daughter

Hello World,

I could not let the month of October go by without acknowledging that this month is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. I lost two of my Delta line sisters to this hideous disease so this is a cause that is very dear to me. When another one of my sorors Keisha Pooler shared on Facebook that she had been diagnosed with breast cancer and began posting pictures of herself at her chemotherapy treatments, I was inspired by her openness and bravery so I thought I would tell her story here. I hope her openness and bravery inspires you as they did me.

Jacquelyn Pullins aka Aunt Jackie

As an invincible and healthy college freshman at Morris Brown College in 1992 with nothing but time ahead of her, the last thing on on Keisha Pullins’ mind was breast cancer. But an arbitrary search for a pen in the lingerie drawer of her Aunt Jackie Pullins, who the Dublin, Georgia native lived with while enrolled in the Atlanta school, put her in the path of the deadly disease in a way that forever changed her trajectory. “I was digging in her drawer, trying to find a pen, and I ran across her prosthetic. It was shaped in foam and had a nipple on it. I asked her, ‘Jackie, What is this?’ She said, ‘It’s a fake titty. What do you think it is?'” Her aunt’s clear-eyed, straightforward answer was representative of the sister relationship that Keisha had with her mother’s baby sister, who was in early 40s, who Keisha saw as mostly a sister but a sometime surrogate mother. Her Aunt Jackie also told her niece to not tell anyone as she did not want anyone to worry about her. However, Keisha was worried. “Her diagnosis changed my life. It was representative of something that could transfer into death in my home, in my family.” From then on, at the recommendation of her Aunt Jackie, who found the lump in her breast, Keisha began doing self-exams and has ever since. While Keisha kept her Aunt Jackie’s secret, her secret revealed itself when her aunt came home to Dublin several months later by the end of Keisha’s freshman year to go the the funeral of Keisha’s stepfather. “At the funeral, she became very ill so she started chemotherapy in Dublin. She never made it back to Atlanta.”

While Keisha continued at Morris Brown College, she returned to Dublin periodically to check on her Aunt Jackie and go with her to her chemotherapy treatments when she could. “She was not married, and she had no children so my sister and I were her kids.” After her treatment, her aunt went into remission for roughly four to five years but the cancer came back in 1997 or 1998. She was told she had months to live, but she didn’t want to go through chemotherapy again. Despite her prognosis, she didn’t pass away until 2001. During that time, however, she continued to live and deliver her deadpan humor. When Keisha asked her Aunt Jackie why she was adamant on getting a loan at one point, her Aunt Jackie replied, “Keisha, I’ll be dead before they get the money back.” “I remember thinking that in that moment, she was laughing and dying simultaneously.” However, there were serious moments too. Her aunt made her the beneficiary of her life insurance policies and showed her where to find all of her important documents. Although Keisha’s mother was her Aunt Jackie’s official caretaker, she felt like the then 25-year-old Keisha would be more responsible. “My Aunt Jackie was adamant about my mom getting a mammogram, but she never did. She always said she was scared to find out.”

Keisha and her husband at the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk on Saturday, October 24. Their daughter is in the background.

In fact, Keisha’s mother, Mary Marshall, would not have a mammogram until she was 68 years old, in May 2013. It was recommended that she get a mammogram as part of a all full-body exam after she got sick with shingles. Keisha was concerned when her mother called her after her mammogram and told her that a biopsy was the next step. She called the medical center and asked about her mother’s results. “I said, ‘I know you’re limited in what information you can give, but do I need to make a trip to Dublin to see my mother?”’ She was told that she should come to Dublin so Keisha and her sister made the trip. The same doctor, Dr. Samson, who took care of her Aunt Jackie during her breast cancer treatment was the same doctor that told Keisha’s mother Mary Marshall in front of her daughters that she too had breast cancer. “My sister had to leave the room. I took out my pen and started taking notes and asking questions. My mom took a deep breath and said, ‘Okay, what do we do next?’ There were no tears. She was stoic.” She was diagnosed with stage 1 breast cancer in June 2013, and six months of chemotherapy followed by four to six months of radiation was recommended for treatment. Mary Marshall says she cannot pinpoint exactly why she waited so long to have her first mammogram except to say that she saw what her sister went through and did not want that for herself. “I just put it out of my mind.” However, her sister’s example came back to her when she was diagnosed with breast cancer. “In my mind, I said, ‘I’m going to be strong like Jackie. ‘”

In fact, her sister’s strength inspired Mary Marshall so much that she urged her daughter to have a follow up exam after Keisha’s first mammogram at 40 years old revealed that she had some cysts that needed to be further evaluated. Keisha delayed making and keeping the appointment for roughly eight to nine months. While she spent spring break with her daughter in Atlanta earlier this year, she told her that she would not leave until Keisha made the appointment. “I had that feeling that she might follow in my footsteps so I said, ‘Keisha, have you gone?'” So Keisha made and kept her follow up

"The beautiful thing about breast cancer is that puts you in a sorority you never asked to be in."

“The beautiful thing about breast cancer is that it puts you in a sorority you never asked to be in.”

appointment. An ultrasound was done, and a more in-depth evaluation was recommended. She was told she get the results in a week. “I went about my life, but I felt like I was in a cloud like when you see a character in a Spike Lee film and their feet aren’t moving. It felt like I was floating,” says Keisha, who is an instructional coach at Maynard Jackson High School in Atlanta. When she got the call, she was at the school. The news wasn’t what she hoped for. “I stopped breathing for a second. I went outside and sat on one of the benches and took my legs up under me. I asked the doctor, ‘Am I going to die?’ He said, ‘I’m not telling you that is going to happen. Let’s take one thing at a time.” Keisha was reassured when her doctor told her he would be meeting with a team of medical professionals to immediately work on a treatment plan for her stage 1 breast cancer. She was also encouraged when he told her that not all breast cancers are the same as Keisha has borderline triple-negative breast cancer. She had a lumpectomy in June and started chemotherapy in July. Now, she is undergoing radiation. She did not hesitate to share her story on Facebook with her community of friends and has shared photographs throughout her treatment. “I’ve been given the gift of speaking and writing. I think I got it from my mother’s father who was a preacher. He was so influential in the community, and he was always being vocal. It something sits inside of me, it sickens me. And I feel like I am soldier on the front lines, and if I kept it to myself, I’m not only doing an injustice to myself but to Jehovah Jireh.”

After she was told about her diagnosis, she told the news to Marcus, her husband of 16 years. “He said, ‘We’re gonna kick cancer’s @$$! You’ve seen your mama. You’ve seen your aunt.'” The couple then told their 10-year-old daughter. Although her eyes were filled with tears, she said, “‘Okay, mama we got this!'” She gave me a high five, and she gave her daddy a high five.” Providentially it seems, after Keisha’s diagnosis, her husband broke his hand in a car accident and as result, he has had to recover at home with Keisha. “I feel like I am a seed that was planted, but I was not meant to be buried, I am planted to bloom.”

Any thoughts?

Posted on Wednesday, October 23, 2013

The Light and the Life that was Lola…

Yesterday, a wife, mother, daughter, friend and my Delta line sister Lola died…When one of my other line sisters told me yesterday, I was stumped. Although my line sister had been wrestling with the enemy that is cancer for 10 years, I never seriously contemplated that she would die. And then I thought about how mysterious and fragile life is…Yesterday was a regular Tuesday, I’m sure, for most of us. I went to work. I logged into Facebook way too many times. I drove home thinking about what I would be eating for dinner. Nothing extraordinary. And then I was told that my line sister had slipped away. Never to be seen on this side of Heaven again. Something extraordinary had happened and I hadn’t discerned it. But that’s life. The ordinary and extraordinary are juxtaposed all of the time even though we don’t always discern it…

19 D.R.S.

I met Lola in the University of Georgia’s Athens in 1995, the year that we were made 19 Devastating Reflections of Sisterhood…Delta girls. I had longed to be Delta since an older cousin and a mentor both regaled me with stories of this dynamic sisterhood years earlier. And now was my chance to be set apart too. Although my insecurities warred within me, I managed to conceal them as I met the girls that would be my line sisters. Since I was teased about my looks as a child, I wondered if my beautiful line sisters would accept me as family. Lola was one of the most beautiful ones to me. Her slanted eyes, her creamy blemish-free skin, her sleek long hair made her stand out on campus. But her beauty wasn’t like a billboard – impossible to ignore but ultimately one dimensional. She could sing. She could dance. She could step. She could play the piano. She had that VIBE, which is the line name our big sisters bestowed on her. And beyond all of that, she was just nice. As I got to know her, I was dumbfounded that she had insecurities too. She even told me that she admired me for my independence and strength! Being bullied for years does have some benefits I guess…

And then one by one, we graduated, not knowing but hoping that we were prepared to conquer the inevitable challenges of adulthood. I ran around Atlanta trying to get somebody to hire me at their company and chasing rappers and actors…I was surprised and maybe a tad ashamed when my line sisters started getting married and acting like adults because in many ways, I still felt like I was a child. Living with my parents until I was 28 years old didn’t help. Lola got married in 2001, and I was so happy that she had found someone that would maneuver the maze that is life with her. They became parents to a son not too much longer afterward. Adulthood looked good on her as just about everything did. And then breast cancer took a swipe at her. In 2003, she was diagnosed with breast cancer for the first time at 28 years old. The 20s were not supposed to be for breast cancer. Breast cancer was supposed to be a challenge for women in their 40s and beyond. But one of adulthood’s lessons is supposed to be is far less common than what actually is. But a mastectomy later, we were all convinced that Lola was fine. At least that is we prayed for.

Statistics are just numbers until they play out in your life. According to the American Cancer Society, one out of every eight women will grapple with invasive breast cancer. Unfortunately, this statistic proved to be true for my line sisters. Our line sister Kimberly Hudson Causby died in May 2005 due to breast cancer. If we didn’t know before, we certainly knew by then the carefree college days were over. It was a big and distasteful dose of adulthood that we had to swallow and digest. And then six years later, a year AFTER the percentage of recurrence supposedly drops, in 2009, at 34 years old, my line sister Lola would have to square off with breast cancer yet again. This time, though, Lola would not be just a breast cancer survivor, she became a breast cancer champion. From Maryland, she organized her supporters, friends, sorors and line sisters and got us to walk with her in the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walk in Atlanta in October 2010 although she was still completing her treatment. We honored Kim and we celebrated Lola! She had warred with breast cancer twice and only managed to become even more beautiful!

That same year I had been awarded a book deal to write my first book “After the Altar Call:

Celebrating Lo at Loca Luna…Isn’t that cake beautiful?!

The Sisters’ Guide to Developing a Personal Relationship With God.” I wanted to interview black women from varied backgrounds and experiences about their encounters with God. I knew I had interview my line sister because I knew her story would be a testament to the best of human strength born in Lola and the infinite and supernatural strength of God. She allowed to me to probe and maybe even pry until we crafted a story that would be permanent evidence of her victory. Now, the day after she has departed, the conversation that became a story is even more poignant. In October 2011, Lola organized all of us again and traveled back to Atlanta for us to take part in the walk for the second time. I was also in the midst of promoting my book, and I had scheduled Lola to be interviewed by Soror and Television Reporter Blayne Alexander of 11 Alive News. Lola was delighted to be interviewed and share her story during National Breast Cancer Awareness Month. Again, a day after she scraped off her earthly clay to allow her heavenly spirit to shine through, I am so thankful that her story was captured on a screen.

In February 2012, my book was released and Lola flew down to come to my book release party. Just seeing her and many of my line sisters celebrating one of my most cherished dreams finally becoming a tangible reality was a memory that will always warm me even on my coldest days. None of us knew that cancer, the gluttonous beast that it is, was waiting to attack my line sister yet again. A few months later, Lola told me the cancer had returned, but it was no longer breast cancer. It had metastasized to other parts of her body. I cried and prayed. If I were a perfect Christian, I guess I would have been free of fear, but I’m not so I wasn’t. But I never imagined her dying. I just continued to pray. I asked my church to pray. After a few months and various treatments, she told her tumors shrank by 50 percent! And in October 2012, Lola and her Brown’s Babes as she named us in 2010 assembled ourselves together again for a third Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk.

Twelve years after Lola got married, I finally felt grown and grounded enough to take care of and be taken care by a husband. Most of this year has been devoted to wedding planning. I checked on Lola periodically and concluded that she was indomitable as she had been for 10 years, particularly when I received an invitation for the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer Walk for this very month. This time, however, Lola opted to take part in the walk in Charlotte, North Carolina instead of Atlanta, Georgia. She told us it was because the walk in Charlotte was closer to home as she had moved back to South Carolina, her home state. I wasn’t sure if I would be able to make it because of some professional obligations here in Atlanta, but I told her that I sent in my donation in her name.

Last week, a week as of yesterday, as I wrote my check, an ugly thought invaded my consciousness. “What if this is the last opportunity I will have to see her?” But I relegated that thought to the outskirts of my mind and mailed my donation. Lola thanked me for my contribution and I went on with the ordinariness of my day convinced that extraordinariness warns like a train horn when it is about to appear. As of yesterday, less than a week after the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer walk in Charlotte on Saturday, I now know that extraordinary had warned me but in my humanity did not perceive it.

Light is often compared with life. The strongest of lights are bright and illuminating and so are the strongest of lives…Imagine today Lola is with the Father of heavenly lights…I don’t know why the Father chose to take her when He did or even have her go through all that she went through when she was here, but I am confident that she has been completely healed and is in Heaven with Him…

Pray her husband, her son, her entire family, friends, sorors, line sisters…all of us that knew and loved her…

Any thoughts?