Healing Steps: Local women walk to honor cancer victim

Thousands of people dressed in pink will flood into Fair Park in Dallas, Texas the first weekend of November.

Cheers will go up. Well-worn walking shoes will be flung in the air triumphantly. Tears will be shed.

And for four women from Johnson County, they’ll be thinking about what breast cancer has taken from them and millions of other people.

Kelly Gough, Cindie Cottingham, April Holok and Kailee Harlow are training for one of the Susan G. Komen 3-Day events to help raise breast cancer awareness. They will walk 60 miles through the Dallas-Fort Worth-area to raise more than $9,000 for breast cancer research and the hope for a cure.

They’ve conditioned their feet to trod for hours each day and prepared their bodies for the Texas sun from Nov. 2 to 4.

They will walk in memory of their friend, sister and aunt, Holly Harlow, a teacher at Whiteland Community High School, who died in 2007 of breast cancer. She was 42.

“I can’t do anything to bring my sister back, but I can for these people who are still fighting,” said Gough, Harlow’s sister. “If I can walk 60 miles, and they can fight cancer, OK.”

The Susan G. Komen 3-Day is a large-scale event held at 14 locations throughout the country. Walkers travel 15 to 22 miles each day.

Each participant is required to raise $2,300. All of the proceeds to fight breast cancer, either through national programs and research or local initiatives to help fund breast screenings, genetic testing and other health services.

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