Thanks Facebook!

I am not oblivious to the irony that I posted a diatribe about this "I'm 12 weeks and craving pickles"  facebook status business being a silly (and somewhat offensive) attempt to bring awareness to breast cancer and it has in fact done that very thing - though only in part by facebook.

Since I posted my blog yesterday morning nearly 3900 people have visited that page - most started off coming from google searches and such, trying to find out why everyone and their grandmother was posting things like "I'm 6 weeks and craving chicken wings" on facebook. Chances are your post menopausal Great Aunt Tilly is not pregnant. But then slowly the tides turned and I'm noticing people coming from emails and facebook. It's ironic that my complaint about how this status game was not bringing awareness to breast cancer is doing that very thing - bringing awareness to breast cancer or, if I have my way - all cancer.

Let's face it, I may be battling breast cancer but I lost my Dad to lung cancer. I've had other family and friends battle other kids of cancer (some have won, some have lost)  For me, the fight is not against Breast Cancer - it's against Cancer. Period.

And I'm not one to miss an opportunity. All this new traffic to my blog is potential to raise more awareness to the cause as a whole.

So for my new visitors, please take a minute to visit my Papa's Pride blog.  You can find out about my family's personal fight against cancer and our aim to raise as much money as we can to go toward finding a cure. If you want to fight cancer, we'll show you how!

And please, take another minute to visit our Papa's Pride page on Facebook and "like" us. You want to raise awareness for cancer, breast or any other kind add that page your list. And encourage your friends and family to as well.

See, awareness only goes so far - we are all aware. But what makes the real difference is the money raised that goes toward cancer research.

In 2010 we raised over $1500 for the Relay for Life. In 2011 we raised over $3500. Our 2012 goal is $5000 and I will PROUDLY walk the Survivor Lap.

So thank you Facebook and whoever thought of posting mock pregnancy symptoms as a cancer awareness tool. And thank you all of you wonderful people who took the time to google these ambiguous status updates. Thank you for visiting my blog and for all my new followers, thank you for the kind words and emails. I am a fighter. I will survive.

I will beat cancer. I have to. I have too much to live for.