I’m proud to announce that with your help I have been able to meet and exceed my $100,000 fundraising goal. Forward Funds helped put us over the top with their $5,000 sponsorship of the Leukemia Cup Regatta. A special thanks to Jeff Cusack and his team at Forward Asset Management who helped take us across the $100K mark.

However, this isn’t a finish line where we stop. It’s simply a new level from which to peer into the future to see what’s possible. Every dollar raised today makes new cancer treatments possible tomorrow. Goals are important milestones but once they are achieved the bar needs to be raised to push the envelope of possibilities. There are solutions and cures for cancer out there and we can find them through funding and support from people like you.

To date, my cancer has been reduced over 95% since diagnosis and my bone marrow samples look normal again. That’s an enormous result in 4 months and due in large part to drugs like Valcade and Revlimid that were partially funded by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society [LLS]. Although these drugs are effective today, researchers aren’t slowing down their march toward finding even better medications or potentially a cure. With the help of these drugs today and a stem cell transplant, my doctors are confident that we can put my cancer into remission. The same holds true for thousands of other blood cancer patients. But remission isn’t necessarily the end goal—it’s the length of time the cancer stays in remission that’s important. A future relapse will require new treatments that must be created today.

As I mentioned earlier, this isn’t where we stop. This is the point at which we can look into the future and see the possibilities. It’s possible that we can raise $200,000 for LLS. It’s possible that new drugs for cancers such as Myeloma don’t have any side effects. It’s even possible that effective solutions found for the treatment of Myeloma could have positive implications for other types of cancer such as Liver, Colon, Lung and Breast Cancer. It’s possible that we’ll find a cure for Myeloma.

These possibilities exist because of you and your support. I urge you to make a donation to help create those possibilities. People like me and thousands of others who are afflicted with blood cancer are counting on you.

Thank you for your support,

Ian