Television Debut!

Wow.  What a day yesterday was!  I hadn’t mentioned this before but last week I got a call from the marketing director at Barnes-Jewish Hospital/Siteman Cancer Center.  He thought my breast cancer survivor story would be a good one to use as one of their feature stories leading up to the Susan G. Komen Race for the Cure on June 12.  He wanted to know if it was ok to forward my name and phone number to the NBC affiliate in STL, KSDK NewsChannel 5.   I said “Sure!” and was excited, but guarded because I wasn’t sure if it would all pan out.

Well….it did! 

The health reporter called me last week and set up an appointment for us to meet yesterday at the Center for Advanced Medicine at Siteman. 

I was SO nervous!  I met with a producer, the cameraman, and the marketing director and I did a 15-minute or so interview there about my journey with breast cancer-how I felt when I was diagnosed, my treatment, and ultimately the Lending A Hand Fund that we have created here in our community.  Then we all headed up to Siteman on the 7th floor and hunted down my nurse Renee and they took some shots with us as well.

Paperwork:Getting mic-ed:   Interviewing:       

The photos don’t do my beet-red face justice, trust me;-)    It was quite the experience, though.  And one I would absolutely do again.  In fact, they asked if they could contact me and follow me through race day and do another interview at the race festivities on June 12.  Well of course!  I said that I would do anything to try and help others through a diagnosis of breast cancer.  Whether public or private, I feel it laid on my heart to minister to others and help them cope with this new world that they’ve been given, and to also realize that the word “cancer” doesn’t always mean that it’s a death sentence. 

After the main interview was over, Jason (marketing guy) asked me to do a little flip cam video for the Barnes Jewish Facebook page.  When I heard “flip cam” the first thing that came to mind was exercises ala Gina!  Hehe;-)  But there were no perfectly demonstrated squats on my tape, just me telling why I’m running on the Siteman team in the Race for the Cure and encouraging others to do the same.  It was fun!

Here’s the clip from their page:

Barnes-Jewish Hospital Erica Griffin of Van Buren, MO was diagnosed with breast cancer in 2008 and over the next year had four surgeries, six cycles of chemotherapy and six weeks of radiation. She just joined the Siteman Cancer Center/NewsChannel 5 Race for the Cure team.

Erica Griffin races to find a cure [HQ]

Length:0:29

 

For anyone interested in donating to my race, please feel free;-) to click on the Komen logo below to go straight to my donation page!  Every penny is appreciated and is going to such an amazing cause.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart to those who have already donated.  I pray that a cure for breast cancer is in the near future so it is a disease my daughter will never have to fear.

Oh, and remember this? One of the many walls of tiles made by cancer survivors that get painted on our last day of treatment??  Well, we found mine yesterday!!! 

Can you see mine?? How ‘bout now? YAY!!  How cool!  It was so awesome to see it hanging up with all the other tiles!  I am so proud of my little tile:-)  I hope that someone sees it someday and reads Mark 5:36 and is instantly given the peace that passes all understanding.  I remember getting off these elevators the first day of coming to Siteman and reading some of the tiles as I walked by and praying that I would be a survivor and would be able to paint my own tile, too.  Thank you, Jesus.

God Bless!

xoxo