Seeing a sea of pink

New Komen director leads fellow survivors in race

STAFF PHOTO SAMANTHA BAKER

Breast cancer survivors cheer as they march in the survivors’ parade at last year’s Race for the Cure. The annual fundraiser will be held Saturday in Rogers and includes 10K and 5K competitive runs, a 5K fun run, 1K family fun walk, a survivors’ breakfast and free giveaways from local vendors.

STAFF PHOTO SAMANTHA BAKER Breast cancer survivors cheer as they march in the survivors’ parade at last year’s Race for the Cure. The annual fundraiser will be held Saturday in Rogers and includes 10K and 5K competitive runs, a 5K fun run, 1K family fun walk, a survivors’ breakfast and free giveaways from local vendors.

Thursday, April 24, 2014

GO AND DO Race for the Cure

When: 7:30 a.m. Saturday

Where: Pinnacle Hills Promenade

Mall, 2203 S. Promenade Blvd. in

Rogers

Registration and information:

(479) 750-7465 or komenozark.org.

Mary Alfrey isn’t new to managing nonprofit groups.

The new executive director at the Ozark Affiliate of Susan G. Komen for the Cure worked as a director for Cedar Valley Hospice in Waterloo, Iowa, before being drawn to what she calls the philanthropic nature of Northwest Arkansas.

“I kept coming to visit,” she said. “I fell in love with the feel of the city, with the climate, the feel of a big city in a small space. In 2011, I toasted that I was going to move here and really started concentrating my job search. I wanted a job that I was passionate about and make a difference.”

That drive led Alfrey to apply with the Susan G. Komen Ozark Affiliate. After a string of inter-views, Alfrey made the move to Northwest Arkansas in March 2013 to become the executive director of a foundation based on a subject close to her heart.

“My sister was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2007,” she said. “She underwent a mastectomy. I saw her go through that. It really made an impression on me.”

And although Alfrey had a personal tie to the disease through her sister, she had no idea how touched her own life would be.

“I was late getting my mammogram,” she explained. “I was thinking, ‘Shoot. I haven’t had my mammogram yet.’ It was late August before I went, and I really should have gone months sooner. They were a little concerned after that test, so I went back in for a follow-up. I had an ultrasound and needle biopsy.

Twenty-four hours later, I got a phone call saying, ‘Yes, you have infiltrating ductile carcinoma.’”

The weeks that followed were consumed with medical appointments. Alfrey chose to undergo a lumpectomy with radiation. Because of the specific nature of the cancer, however, it was not enough.

“Because I am what is called triple negative, the medications usually given after surgery were not going to be enough,” she said. “I had to get chemo to keep it from coming back.”

Two weeks into her 18 weeks of chemotherapy treatments, Alfrey shaved her head. “The doctor had said, ‘I can keep you from feeling sick, but I can’t keep you from losing your hair,” she said. “So I had some pink champagne, and we shaved it all off. It was difficult to go through, but Iwas lucky to have my friend Cindy Bucknam next to me at every treatment.”

But Alfrey considers the outpouring of support to be more than luck.

“I think I was right where I was supposed to be,” she said. “I was somewhat prepared, and I didn’t have to do it alone.”

photo

Courtesy Photo Mary Alfrey celebrates her last radiation treatment at Highlands Oncology in Fayetteville. The new executive director at the Susan G. Komen Ozark Affiliate was diagnosed with breast cancer shortly after taking the job in March 2013.

Alfrey was flanked by her daughters, friends and colleagues from the foundation, including Board President Kari Nikolish, who went with her to her first pre-op appointment, and Danna Grear, M.D., a foundation board member and the physician who diagnosed her.

“Mary wasn’t the first friend or acquaintance I had to give that news to,” Grear said. “She had just come in for a routine screening, and it was abnormal, so I called her. I’ve had to give this news to colleagues before. I had to gothrough this myself.”

Grear was diagnosed with the same cancer as Alfrey, infiltrating ductile carcinoma, in July 2012, and underwent a double mastectomy and reconstruction to treat the disease.

“I always have been involved in some way with the race,” she said. “But now I feel like I have a better understanding of the experience. I always felt like I was an empathetic physician, but this has shown me how overwhelming the experience is. Even knowing what I do, it was hard to know what to do. I can’t imagine doing this alone.”

Alfrey, who completed her final radiation treatment on April 18, hopes her experience will help highlight the importance of what she does.

“I know I went through this to help others,” she said. “I know what the experience is like now, so I can walk alongside the survivors. So many women aren’t as lucky as I am, which is where Komen steps in.”

Susan G. Komen for the Cure is hosting the 16th annual Race for the Cure on Saturday in Rogers as a fundraiser for breast cancer research and supportive aid.

“The race makes everything possible,” said Alfrey.

“It’s where we receive most of the funding. We really have an activity for everyone - Sleep In for the Cure, Bark for the Cure. It’s a day where you can get inspiration and celebrate survivors. There’s nothing like seeing that sea of pink.”

“Surviving breast cancer made me appreciate what we do at the Komen Foundation,” Grear added. “I see a lot of patientscome into my office who have received funding from Komen. Some patients are not coming in because they don’t have the money. But that’s where Komen comes in. There is money available.

“We have so many needs met in Northwest Arkansas every year,” she said. “But there’s still lots of needs that go unmet.”

The majority of the funds raised at this weekend’s event will benefit Northwest Arkansas directly, said Alfrey. A quarter of the funds will go to research, which she described as coming back to the area in the form of knowledge.

“My hope is that research will find a cure,” she said. “One of the reasons I do this is so my daughters won’t have to go through it. So that others’ daughters won’t have to go through this.

“I am just so blessed to have been in Northwest Arkansas and to be with the Komen Foundation when I was diagnosed,” she said. “I couldn’t have been in a better place.”

Style, Pages 29 on 04/24/2014