I'm ready to be a "mento"

Anyone remember the episode of Friends when Joey said he wanted to be a "mento" instead of mentor? A lot funnier when he did it. I miss that show, it was hilarious.

Last night I attended my Team in Training mentor training. It was long, but it was cool, particularly when we got to break out and meet the other mentors and coaches from our particular training sites. Everyone was really cool, and I think it's going to be a great season. I'm excited to get to know some new TNT folks. They are always good people :).

As a mentor, I'm going to be assigned a group of runners, and it's my job to check in with them weekly, help them to develop a fundraising strategy, motivate, encourage, and help them to stick with the program. I think the most daunting part for people is the fundraising aspect. If you stick with the training, you will likely be able to do the running part, but it's really tough asking people for money right now. The mentors are going to come up with some fundraisers to help our participants..... I'm really excited. This cause means so much to me (a huge DUH to anyone who reads this regularly! ;)), and I want to make sure we get as many people sticking with the program as possible.

I learned some disturbing things last night about the state of their funding right now. Like every organization out there, the economy has hurt them. They've experienced layoffs, and they have had to cut back funding for both research and patient services. One of the neat things about LLS is they have provided a $500 a year stipend to folks for travel expenses. This can be used to pay the exorbitant hospital parking fees, gas, airfare (because SO many people come from out of town to MD Anderson), hotel.... whatever they want to use it for. Well, they have recently had to reduce that number to $150, which is huge. Consider the fact that a lot of cancer patients have to quit their jobs, so their families already feel the financial crunch. It's so scary. And not being able to fund research? That terrifies me. It stalls our progress toward finding a cure for blood cancers, and it means we are going to lose more people to this disease.

On that note, I'm going to be officially registering this weekend to be a participant in the Houston Half-Marathon in January. That's right, I'm not only going to be a mentor, I'm also going to be a runner and fundraiser for this event. After swearing I would never run again after last season, I realized my work IS NOT DONE. This year my fundraising minimum is $2,400. I hope to raise at least $5,000. I hope that anyone out there reading this blog will help to support me on this mission. I can assure you that you'll be hearing plenty from me over the next 6 months.

Go Team!