It’s been a week now since we descended from the summit of Mt. Fuji. I think back and feel the smile on my face. I fondly remember standing on top of Mt. Fuji, with the sun rising in the background, arm-in-arm with a new family. A family of patients with multiple myeloma, patients’ family members, a doctor, employees of our sponsor, Takeda Pharmaceuticals, our amazing Multiple Myeloma Research Foundation (MMRF) staffers and a couple of us who have sadly lost someone we love to this terrible disease.

My father, at 63, lost his life to a cancer most people never hear of until it happens to someone they know and love. After nearly 12 years of fighting this deadly cancer, my father couldn’t outrun it anymore. All his treatment options had been tried and had failed. It would’ve been easy to walk away from the MMRF and not look back. My father was gone. There was nothing the MMRF could do to bring him back.

In the 18 months after my father’s passing, the MMRF helped bring 3 new drugs to market that are helping multiple myeloma patients all over the world. I think to myself, why couldn’t he have held on a little longer? Just three months more and he would’ve had a new drug to try. I had a 3-week-old son who would never get to know his Papa. That was a very hard pill to swallow, but then I started to think about all the patients out there who still could benefit from these new drugs — all the papas not getting to take their grandsons to ballgames. I wanted to be a part of helping these papas of the world getting to know their grandchildren, even if our Papa didn’t.

When I was selected to be a part of this Mt. Fuji team, I was excited. I did want to help rid the world of multiple myeloma, but things really changed once I met our team members, whom I now consider family. I heard so many of them say to me, “It’s great that you are still in the fight!” But I was no longer fighting for this general idea of curing cancer. I was fighting for my “dad” (Jeff), my “sister” (Deana) and the rest of our team of patients (Leslie, Patti, Ryan and Steve). And I was there to cry with my “sister” Lauren, whose mom is currently in remission but still understands the reality of this diagnosis, as there still is no cure.

Standing on the summit was awe-inspiring in itself, but hearing “Amazing Grace” being played by Ryan was, to me, the highlight of my experience on that mountain. I felt so close to my dad. I had his picture and the small Snoopy that my daughter had given to him, and I just breathed it all in as the tears flowed. That moment will forever stick in my mind and I’m grateful that I had the opportunity to share in this amazing accomplishment.

I feel so incredibly blessed to have been a part of such a monumental task and so proud of our entire team. Seeing all 6 of our patients get to the top of that mountain and get to the bottom (because as one of our amazing tour guides on Fuji, Brent, said, “it’s not about getting to the top, it’s about getting to the bottom!”) will forever be burned in my mind. They are the true heroes who are fighting this disease every day or gearing up to fight it. I climbed for them, I climbed to honor my dad, and I climbed to help find an end to this disease.