What does a 5K run, a baseball tournament, a home run derby, a golf outing, a music festival, HootaThon, and Rock for CHOP all have in common? They helped raise much needed funds to support research and life-saving treatments at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.
Hear their stories. See their faces. Get inspired.
Transcript
A Million Stories. One Cause.
Barb Kuleba: My name is Barb Kuleba and I host a 5k Run/Family Fun Walk.
Ralph Suarez: My name is Ralph Suarez, and this is my bride of 35 years, Denise.
Denise Suarez: And we're holding a baseball tournament.
Craig Mullen: We do a Home Run Derby and we do a golf outing every year.
Melynda Link: I'm part of HootaTHON, Temple University's Dance Marathon.
Cholly Kenney: Hi, I'm Cholly Kenney. This is my little girl, Kara Kenney.
Kara Kenney: We Rock for CHOP!
Cholly Kenney: And we Rock for CHOP.
Barb Kuleba: My son Zach was diagnosed with Crohn's disease before he turned two.
Lauren Zdeb: When I was midway through my pregnancy, Chelsea was diagnosed with congenital diaphragmatic hernia. The first thing I asked the doctors is, "Will my baby be okay? Will my baby be okay?"
Denise Suarez: Richie was diagnosed two days before he left for Rowan University with high-risk acute lymphoblastic leukemia.
Barb Kuleba: We wanted to give something back and I wanted a way to empower him and to make him feel that he was more powerful than this disease.
Joe Zdeb: So we decided a couple of years ago to, after she was born, to start a music festival down at the Jersey Shore. They said, "If your child's a rock star, the best prognosis is, you know, they'll be delivered here at CHOP. They'll be put in the NICU and ..."
Chelsea Zdeb: I'm rock star.
Joe Zdeb: All the doctors and nurses said that she was a rock star ever since.
Barb Kuleba: The race began as a way for everyone to be able to participate.
Melynda Link: Dance marathon is so hard to describe. But it's so easy to see why you want to do it.
Dominique McDuffe: It made me feel like I, I can make a difference no matter, no matter where I am.
Cholly Kenney: My boss, Mike Slackta, he likes to do everything in a big way. So he took what was going to be a Beef and Beer in the afternoon with a couple bands. Next thing you know we had an event in the parking lot with moon bounces and pig roasts and ...
Kara Kenney: And yummy pizza!
Cholly Kenney: And yummy pizza.
Barb Kuleba: The first Walk for Hope I believe raised $38,000. It has grown now to about 450 people. Last year's event raised over $110,000.
Melynda Link: We had our first in November of 2013. We raised $60,000. And this past November, we raised $119,000 for CHOP.
Cholly Kenney: The name of our organization was Team Kara and in three years we've raised $85,000.
Kara Kenney: That's me dad.
Cholly Kenney: That's you, Kara.
Stephanie Ferry: Not only do you get to say,"Oh, I achieved my goal of raising a hundred thousand dollars or more." But you get to say, "I achieved this goal and I get to give it to the kids at CHOP."
Michelle Liston: We've never seen so many people willing to drop everything to come and help my family, which is, we couldn't be more grateful.
Barb Kuleba: It's such an awful amazing day and it's so much energy and it just really inspires people.
Cholly Kenney: At the end of that day, I feel like Superman sometimes.
Craig Mullen: You hear this all the time, but it never gets old. I mean, it's, it's the clinicians at CHOP. It's the Child Life Services at CHOP.
Denise Suarez: Not only did they take care of Richie, they took care of all of us.
Lauren Zdeb: We cannot thank CHOP and every single doctor, nurse, and everyone that is affiliated with this place enough, for giving us our two little miracles and for making it be such a rewarding experience.
Ralph Suarez: You'll win if you don't quit and he just followed it through to the Nth degree.
Denise Suarez: He's an amazing young man.
Craig Mullen: Andrew Farrell is our inspiration for the foundation.
Lauren Zdeb: I tell Chelsea that every night before she goes to bed, that she is my inspiration.
Barb Kuleba: Without research there can be no cure.
Michelle Liston: I hope that ultimately we can find a cure for it. And until that happens, we just continue to, to fine tune the medicine so that they're going to get to experience the rest of their life.
Mackenzie Calderbank: To do something that's meaningful, that's reason enough.
Craig Mullen: But what we really want to do is really help the mission of CHOP.
Barb Kuleba: People think that they have to make a huge contribution, a huge donation to make a difference, and you don't. Every dollar you donate or that you raise has such a huge impact. There are so many families out there struggling with so many issues with their children. And to be able to give back to CHOP is an amazing feeling.
Denise Suarez: There's thousands of people that are going through what we've already gone through. And this is, this is the way we're going to stop this.