Team Amy

Hello Team Amy! It’s time, once again, to bring together our friends and family to honor our sweet Amy’s memory, while supporting the work of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. We created this team 15 years ago in 2009, a few short months after we lost Amy. When that spring arrived, I was already nervous about Amy’s birthday on May 30. There are so many firsts when you lose someone you love and I knew that the first birthday would be rough. But then something happened that made me realize that the universe will right itself and take care of you when you have forgotten how to find your own way. The Cystic Fibrosis Foundation was sponsoring one of their Great Strides walks - in Placentia – at Tri-City Park (a few blocks from our home) where Amy had spent countless afternoons playing as a child – on May 30, Amy’s birthday. We had never walked in one of the Great Strides walks before. We had thought about it many times but illness, treatments and life itself had just kept us from ever organizing a team. Here was an opportunity to support one of the CFF’s grand fundraising efforts while we gathered Amy’s friends and family together to honor her memory while walking and being together on her birthday. We had a means to use our grief for something truly positive! When the location moved from Placentia, we moved our team to the Huntington Beach walk and that’s where we’ve been since 2011!

Ever since that first walk, we have looked forward to reuniting our team so that we might take a moment and reflect on the inspirational life that Amy lived. We have proudly worn our Team Amy t-shirts that have Amy’s rules written on the back. Those rules came from her writing that we found in one of Amy’s journals when we were planning her service. One night, not long after we had returned from my mother-in-law’s memorial service in 2007, I leaned my head into the door of her bedroom to say good-night and she held up a small journal and said, “Here it is. This is what I want so that there’s no question.” When we read her words inside that tiny journal, we heard her familiar voice in the words she had written. We heard her acceptance of her disease and her philosophy about how we should all live our lives. She wrote: “Lately I’ve been forced to think about what happens after we leave this earth because the death of my beloved grandmother has shocked us all. I just want to put it in writing, as painful as it may be, what I want for me, just so there is no question. I do not want anyone to be sad the whole time. When my friend passed away, I really liked how they made it a celebration of her life. I strive to live each day embracing life, so that’s what I want everyone to take from me. Live life how you want to and don’t be afraid to take risks. Life is not worth living, in my opinion, if you don’t take risks and merge out of your comfort zone every now and then. I try to let those close to my heart know just how much they mean to me on a regular basis. And I want everyone to smile at least once.” And with that, we had Amy’s rules. She left these important instructions for us, but they were always her personal guidelines for living that she exemplified time and time again. We wear them on our t-shirts to remind us of the lessons she taught us about living while she was still here.

We are so excited that we will be be able to gather Team Amy in Huntington Beach again this year. We hope that you will be able to join us on Saturday, May 11, for Team Amy's 15th Great Strides Walk near the Huntington Beach Pier. This beautiful setting is the perfect place to pay tribute to our dear Amy, celebrate her beautiful life and support the efforts of the CF Foundation. There is a core group of friends and family that is there every year, but at each walk, we are amazed at how many other walkers show up for our team who never even knew her, but still come to help us celebrate all that was good in Amy’s life, honor her sweet memory and help us use our grief for a cause so dear to our hearts. If you are unable to join us, we hope that you will consider making a donation to our team. Thank you so much! Here’s the link to join our team and/or make a donation to Team Amy. I will give you updated information about our T-shirts as soon as I have more information. Thanks so much!