The GREETERS​​​: ​​​​  

 

 

Here is Boyd Preston, greeter ready for action. Standing back is Chuck King, who introduces our guest speakers.

 

And here are some members who came in early

 

And here are a few more...

 

And here is the Club Rotary Foundation Committee meeting: Ron Hollenbeck, Joyce Young, and Harvey Smith

 

And here is club member Arnie Biondi coming in after being greeted by Brad and Boyd

 

And now you see Boyd putting out a hand to club member Dan Sortman. Frank Perez stands to the left and Brian Hayes gives a big smile on the right, always a delight.

Chuck King introduced our speaker Christine Baldwin. He said she joined the Noble Circle Project in March 2016 and now serves on their board as Fund-raising Chair. She has been thriving beyond breast cancer for three years.

Chuck said Christine has a masters degree in gerontology and has worked on grant writing and management in the areas of Public Health and Human Services.

He said she is currently a stay-at-home mom and resides in Centerville with her husband Clay and three children: Connor, 19, Luke, 15, and Annie, 13.

 

Christine said she came to tell her story of how she found The Noble Circle Project, and how it benefited her. She said everything can change in a moment, and it did for her. That moment was on Aug. 22, 2014, when she discovered a lump under her left arm. Her older sister had breast cancer twice before her death, she said.

She had an ultra sound and it showed an abnormal lymph node. The doctor suggested it be removed and biopsied. She had two lymph nodes removed in two separate surgeries, she said. When the doctor in to give her the results she said she could tell it was not going to be good news. He handed her some papers and told her she had cancer. 

One in eight women will be diagnosed with breast cancer, and one in three women will have some kind of cancer and one in two men will have some kind of cancer, she said. She was 46 when she got the news. Her children were then 10, 12, and 16. It was very scary, daunting, she said. She had a fighting warrior spirit and checked out books and made changes to her diet. Two weeks before Christmas she had surgery. She received meals and flowers and pink ribbons from friends and neighbors. Only one lymph node was cancerous and there was a one in ten chance it would spread. With today's medical breakthroughs there's a good chance to win the battle, she said.

With chemo and target infusions and radiation.

She said she dreaded losing her hair, so on her 47th birthday she cut her long hair short and got a wig and hats and scarves. In three weeks her husband shaved her head and they had matching bald heads for a while. At the end of treatment she was at her lowest point, she said. "No one understood how I was feeling," she said. It was more than a year and she had seen doctors, nurses, friends, family, and lost body parts, and had low energy and was a grieving person.

Then she heard of The Noble Circle at Miami Valley South Hospital. It was the next level of her recovery, she said. The Noble Circle program is a life changing program, giving women a helping hand in regaining their sense of empowerment. It has a new sister program, which begins with a weekend retreat that is followed by a ten week program for wellness. The wellness program includes three pillars. The first is nutrition, the second is complementary energy techniques, which includes an in-depth study of qigong, a gentle form of movement that strengthens the qi, or life energy. and the third is peer support. 

Christine said she had a new circle of friends she could share her thoughts and experiences with. There were three of them with a child at home and they were able to talk about being mothers and having to care for their children. The program is free of charge and is for any type of cancer. 

The program was started in 2002 by eight Dayton women, she said. When she started she was uncertain because she didn't know anyone in the group. The program was an hours drive away and she car-pooled with three women she didn't know. By the time they arrived they had already begun to bond, she said. People were in all stages of cancer. Some had multiple mastectomies and others had not developed their disease. When she found that a woman in the fourth stage of cancer could laugh and dance, it gave her hope, she said. "We are Family" is what comes out of the program, she said. Once in the program you can still go to monthly educational meetings, volunteer, take leadership roles, etc. There is no paid staff, so the group depends on donations to support making the program free to those who join. In February they hold a fashion show at Sinclair as a fund-raiser, and she got to be one of the fashion models last year. "Our goal is to thrive beyond cancer," she said.

She now does yoga, meditation, hiking, etc. "Even in hard times there is hope," she said. "You can join together in love, friendship, and community. Let your life shine." She said more information can be found on the Web at www.noblecircle.org

 

 She showed a picture of the full group. The Noble Circle takes two groups of 30 women a year.

 

 

And here you see Ron leading the reciting of Rotary's Four-Way Test

 

 

The song we sing for the upcoming Pancake Breakfast Fund-raiser Oct. 28, from 7 a.m. to noon, is

Don Gerhardt's original Pancake Breakfast song, sung to the tune of Take Me Out to the Ball Game.

 

The meeting was closed with the reciting of the Rotary Four-Way Test.