Walk with us!
We are less than 5 months away from this year’s Light the Night walk. This year is the second year that Team Gary’s Guardian Angel’s will be walking. Unfortunately this year we are walking in memory of Gary and Mikey and I will be carrying the lit up gold balloon that symbolizes those that we lost leukemia and lymphoma. There are a few things that makes this year’s walk THAT much more special in my book.
#1 -Gary is one of this year’s Honored Heroes. 
What an honor for our family, he’d never expect something like that in a million years.
#2 – At last year’s walk one of Gary’s coworkers, Gretchen, who raised over $1k in a matter of a week got a medal for having raised so much money. Well I happened to be standing right next to Gary with the camera turned on just as she was giving her medal to him because he was such an inspiration to her. That night I told Gary that next year (now this year) I will be up on stage getting my medal too because I will raise over $1k just myself. I WILL!!!!
So here I am soliciting people to walk with us at this year’s event. It’ll be on November 13th, at Huzienga Park in Ft. Lauderdale.
If you’d like to join our team you can by clicking HERE.
If you can’t join us for whatever reason but would like to help me get to my $1k goal you can do so by navigating to my personal page or by clicking HERE
Thank you! With your help we can get the money that researchers need to come up with a cure for blood cancers so that no other families have to be broken apart like mine has been.
Help me Light the Night
I’m here sharing the link to my Light the Night fundraising page once again. This year my goal is to raise $1000 on my own. At last year’s walk one of Gary’s coworkers/friend (Gretchen) who is very active with the LLS had raised over $1k in a matter of a week. She got a fancy yellow shirt and a medal. Well she knew exactly what she was doing with the medal even before she received it. She was going to give it to Gary. Just so happens I was right there the moment she presented it to him, armed with my camera too.
Here’s the moment that to this day gives me chills all over my body:
After she gave him the medal I told Gary that at the next walk I’m going up on stage with my fancy shmancy yellow shirt and getting myself a medal. And now more than ever do I intend to meet that goal. Not for me, but for Gary.
So help me Light the Night and donate what you can, every little bit DOES help!
Thank you for your help and your support. With your help we will find a cure for Leukemia and Lymphoma!
Sharing is Caring
I just emailed the bio and picture for Gary’s Honored Hero bio for this year’s Light the Night walk. I fully expect that the lengthy bio will be severely edited to make it shorter, but no biggie. I’d rather give them more info than not enough. I’d like to share what I wrote, along with one of the pictures that I submitted of my wonderful husband, I think he would have been proud of this:
In 2007, Gary and his wife were excited and happier than ever as they were expecting their first child. Unfortunately, his world, their world, would soon change during a routine physical when his primary doctor discovered that his platelets were very low. He was then referred to a hematologist/oncologist. The first doctor Gary had gone to mentioned leukemia and lymphoma as a possibility. But this doctor was just not as aggressive in getting to a diagnosis as Gary would like. So, he searched for another opinion.
Gary started seeing a new doctor at Mt. Sinai who immediately ran a number of tests looking for answers. This doctor’s more proactive approach was just what Gary had been searching for. Two days before Gary’s son, Michael, was born, this new doctor came back with a diagnosis of T-Cell Large Granular Lymphocytes Leukemia (T-Cell LGL). This diagnosis was a wait-and-watch situation and would require routine visits every 3 months only to find out that nothing has really changed.
In January 2009, his oncologist still wasn’t 100% convinced it was leukemia. A few weeks later, his wife, Samantha, came across an article on CNN’s website regarding a doctor up at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), studying rare diseases. She sent the article immediately to Gary and he said “Make it happen” so she did. He traveled up to the NIH for tests at the end of April. On May 5th, he got a call with the results, that six of the nation’s top pathologists all agreed that he had Peripheral T-Cell Lymphoma (PTCL). The PTCL was in his bone marrow, blood, and even in his spinal fluid. The doctors urged that he start receiving chemotherapy immediately.
During the summer of 2009, Gary along with his wife by his side every step of the way traveled up to the NIH every 3 weeks. The treatment at NIH was the best possible chance for Gary’s extremely rare case of PTCL. As a life-long math and science enthusiast, Gary decided to participate in a clinical trial. He knew that even if the treatment didn’t help him, it could possibly help someone else with this rare condition. This very intensive chemo regimen left Gary very weak, but his determination to continue fighting remained stronger than ever.
In his determination to continue living a “normal” life, Gary returned to work only a month after his last treatment. Though he was only able to work half days, he enjoyed every minute of it because it kept him in his comfort zone. After several months of trying to regain his strength, Gary suddenly came down with a case of pneumonia on Christmas Day. This was not the gift he and his family had been hoping for. After an extremely intense and emotional week in the hospital, Gary passed away on New Year’s Day.
Gary always found a way to make people around him smile, even when he was feeling his worst. He was a very talented man who played the trumpet for the Marching Chiefs at FSU, guitar and even the piano. He’d never miss a chance to play football or basketball with friends. Gary was very determined and nothing ever stood in his way, not even his lymphoma! Even though he was only 33 years old when he passed, he was definitely the greatest husband, father, and son anyone could ask for. He is dearly missed.
His fight against lymphoma lives on in those that he left behind. Through them, we will continue to fight for a cure, because that’s what Gary would have wanted.
An Honored Hero!
This afternoon, much to my surprise, I got an email from Jill over at the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society’s South Florida Chapter asking me how I felt about having Gary as one of their Honored Hero’s for the 2010 Light the Night Walks. I could not believe I was being asked this. What an HONOR to even be asked about this. I immediately wrote back and told her that on behalf of my family we’d be honored for Gary to be one of their Honored Hero’s this year. I STILL can’t believe I was asked this but I have the email as proof
Not in a million years would Gary ever think that he’d be considered an Honored Hero for anything let alone something cancer related. Just the thought that the local chapter thought of Gary just amazes me and I’m just speechless and so very humbled by it. Such an amazing honor for Gary and shoot for Mikey and I too to be apart of. Mikey will be barely 3 years old at this year’s walks and I hope he’ll somehow remember everything about it because this year will be a much different walk for us. This year instead of Gary walking with us with his white survivor balloon, survivor t-shirt, and his big ole walking stick we’ll be walking for him holding his lit up gold balloon. *sigh* It won’t be an easy walk to do at all but I know Gary will be there with us in spirit and he’ll be smiling down and Mikey and me for continuing the fight for him.
I’m the team captain of 2 teams this year. One for the Miami walk and another for the Ft. Lauderdale walk. When I posted earlier about how I really felt this was my mission in life, I’m serious about it. It’s my mission to help the LLS raise as much money as possible to help bring a cure to blood cancers.
So if you can spare some of your hard-earned money please do not hesitate to donate towards a FANTASTIC cause. Here are the links to my two personal pages Miami Walk and Ft. Lauderdale Walk. You can donate to either one of my donation pages. Really every little bit helps us out.
Help me meet my goal of $1000 so that I can get my medal like I promised Gary I would at last year’s walk 
Light the Night 2009 a night to remember
Our first ever Light the Night walk was the most amazing experience ever. Our fabulous team, Gary’s Guardian Angels, ended up raising over $3k for the LLS! That is a heck of a lot more than my initial goal of $1000 too That is $3k more that can go towards research and helping out patients that they didn’t have before we raised it. For us research is HUGE just because Gary’s form of lymphoma (Peripheral T-Cell Lymphoma) is soooooooo very rare. Not many people have it and of those not many participate in clinical trials, which makes research very very precious. So if the money we’ve raise can help out with that at all then that’s FABULOUS!
We had a kick ass banner that had a collage of pictures from Gary’s chemo treatments that filled in each letter of his name. I thought it kicked ass even if it didn’t with the banner contest
Here’s our fabulous banner:
Here is one of my favorite pictures from the night. It was taken after we first arrived. Mikey wanted to play airplane with daddy and I just so happened to get a pic of Mikey going in for a big hug with his daddy and more importantly you can see Gary’s fancy shmancy Survivor shirt.
One of the most touching moments of the night was witnessing something between Gary and his coworker, Gretchen. A little backstory, Gretchen has been very involved with the LLS for years. Her mom died of leukemia several years back. Well, she has been a huge supporter of Gary’s fight against lymphoma. She managed to raise over $1k in a matter of just 4 days for the walk! Talk about a kick ass fundraiser. I surely need to get tips from her for next year Well if you raise over $1k you get a fancy Bright Lights t-shirt and a medal. Well she got her medal and came straight to Gary to present the medal to him. I was standing right there and had the camera around my neck and snapped this photo. The look on his face says it all, he was completely in shock and humbled by her fabulous gesture.
I don’t think that’s a moment that any of us will ever forget.
All in all the night was amazing. It’s really hard to describe in words how awesome it is to see all of these people with red (for supporters), white (for survivors), and gold balloons (for walking in memory of). But to see the sea of balloons build up as the walk starts, even as windy as it was, its just absolutely breathtaking. To be around soooooo many others that feel just as strongly about coming closer to a cure for blood cancers its just something that is so absolutely amazing and I am so grateful to have taken part in such an awesome event.
Here is a quick team pic as we started off on the walk, its not everyone, but it was the best we were gonna do at the time.
I’m already excited for the 2010 walk, you better believe the Zullo’s will be making this is regular event for our family, and we willl be beating this year’s fundraised amount too!!!!
A week and a half to the walk!!!!!
I can’t believe the walk is finally almost here. I’m beyond excited too. I’m excited to not only walk amongst family and friends but to more importantly have the guy we are walking for, Gary, join us. Yay! I think this walk will have so much more meaning for us because of the fact that Gary is truly a survivor. To be amongst others that are fighting the fight against cancer will just mean so much to us. It has been a roller coaster ride that I know neither of us will ever forget. There were way more down’s than up’s but we seem to be past all of the crappy stuff for now.
So here I go with my final push for donations of any kind. Remember even a $1 donation will help make a difference!
If you are interested in donating please click on this link: DONATE HERE!
1 month until we Light the Night :)
When I first created our team for the Light the Night walk it felt like it was forever away. Probably because we were in the middle of chemotherapy treatments and time just freezes when you are going through that. Well, today marks the 1 month away mark. We are officially 1 month from our 1st walk in honor of Gary’s fight against Lymphoma. This will be our very first walk like this, and it definitely won’t be the last. Even though we are crossing our fingers and hoping that he’s cancer-free we will never be able to forget all that he’s gone through. This is just something you never can forget.
Cancer in general is not something fun to have, shoot its not something you wish on your worst enemy. That’s how bad it is. It affects the entire family, not just the individual going through it. So if I can help raise money to find a cure, or to at least help those researchers that need the money to get closer to one, or help those families that are just living to get by because they are spending so much of their hard earned money to make ends meet so that a family member can win their fight, well then I’ve done my part.
If you can spare just $1 (we’d love more of course), you too can help. Click on the link below to Join our team and walk alongside us or to donate to help our team raise as much money as we can against this fight!
Thank you for reading my blog and following our story
Support Light the Night Pub Crawl Style
Big Thanks to Eric for replying to a post of mine about the event the Ft. Lauderdale Pub Crawl is hosting this Saturday the 29th starting at 9pm in support of Light the Night!!!!
The event starts at America’s Backyard in downtown Ft. Lauderdale. Spread the word and come out to support the LLS!
I wish I could be there but I’ll be busy packing for our trip back up to DC for round #5!
If you haven’t joined our LNT team yet please come by and join us for our kick ass team that will be walking on November 7th.
Join us and help us raise money to cure Leukemia and Lymphoma!!!!!
Let’s Light the Night Ft. Lauderdale!!!
Yesterday I happened upon the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society webpage as I do every once in awhile. I happened to see actress/comedian, Tina Fey’s, name and decided to look into it. Well apparently she’s the 2009 Light the Night Walk National Spokesperson. Pretty cool. I watcher her video and got chills throughout my body when she said “Cancer. It’s a dark word. When it’s directed at you or a loved one, it can turn your world upside-down…”. I couldn’t have said it better myself because I do believe that it has turned our world upside-down.
After watching the video I decided to create a team in hopes of bringing together the family and friends that have been by our side throughout this entire god-awful journey. So Team Gary’s Guardian Angels was born.
I’m excited to get everyone to walk along Gary and me this November. By then he should be done with chemo and will be on the mend and what a better way to show cancer that we kicked it in its ass than to get a large group of people to show cancer that we did it together!
Oh and here’s the video that gave me the push I needed to start up our team:
A recent widow and single mom doing my best to survive on my own.
Last year I told Gary that I'd raise $1k at the 2010 walk, please help me reach my goal. This year Gary is one of the Honored Heroes for the walk so its even extra special to me. :) Just click on the Sponsor Me image to be taken to my fundraising page. Thank you!!!
Help me get to my 1st Half Marathon in Walt Disney World where I will run in memory of Gary :)
