Embrace the Suck: Overwhelmed, but in a good way

We are now a week past Amanda's last chemo, and she is being visited by its many horrors. So much so that she actually took her seventh sick day since being diagnosed in October. You read that correctly. Since being told one of the worst things that a person can hear, three biopsies in two weeks, countless appointments, 6 rounds of chemotherapy and just all around crappiness, she has taken seven, 7, SEVEN, siete, sept, セブン sick days. What a woman. There is really no way that I can put into words how proud I am of her and the way that she has handled this.
Apparently, I am not the only one who feels this way. She has been getting cards from supporters on a weekly basis. People on the Facebook page we have set up for her are daily giving her encouragement and love. Her family and friends are always sending her texts and emails to check in, not to mention calls and visits. Then, this past Friday, her old roller derby teammates at Naptown Roller Girls, essentially, made an entire bout all about Amanda and her fight.
Fire Anne Brimstone (FAB), aka, Jennifer Duba, a former teammate and friend, contacted me a little over a week ago to see if I could sub in to sing the National Anthem at a bout. I accepted, because it is one of my favorite events to open, and I consider it an honor. Then I found out that there was more to it. The hope was to have a tribute of sorts to Amanda while I sang. In short, FAB cut out, by hand, 60+ ginormous pink ribbons and distributed them to the crowd, the Fan Club helped hand out hundreds of pink ribbon stickers to all of the attendees, skaters even got involved by putting them on their helmets, some folks dyed their hair pink, a friend and former teammate had a t-shirt made dedicated to Amanda, aka, Joanie Loves Debauchery (JLD), the bout program had a dedication to her, the announcers made a special announcement about it as did the announcer on the streamingcast... to call it overwhelming is an understatement. Amanda was not able to be there, but was able to watch the live stream to see the sea of pink and hear the announcers give her a shout out. I called her right after singing and we just talked about how we couldn't find the words for how amazing this was. I will just shut up and let the pics do the talking.


FAB and all of her FAB-u-lous ribbons.

A good shot of my own JLD shirt.
(Photo by Tom Klubens)

Diane Beatin, Cereal Killer, Cherry Uncordial and Elise showing love.

Jane Ire in her Notorious JLD shirt.

Founding fan club member and my friend Richard Levesque defaced the back of his Wam Bam poster for this. If that's not love, then I don't know what is. (Photo by Tom Klubens)