Pretty in Pink champion Ann Suttles takes a lesson at Carolina Paddleboard
Company as part of Pretty in Pink’s Beyond the Ribbon wish program.
She was amazed. “It’s easy for someone to pay your
bills, but the personal touch is what is most important,”
Wade says.
The woman told her that Pretty in Pink, originally
based in Raleigh, was thinking of opening an office in
Wilmington. Wade jumped at the chance, becoming the
Wilmington program manager the next week.
Pretty in Pink has become more than just a job for Wade.
“When you sit with those ladies who are having blood
transfusions and surgeries and chemotherapy, you can’t
help but have it become a passion. You literally are chang-ing
people’s lives,” she says.
Just as passionate about the cause, Gail Calloway of
the Ta Ta Sisterhood of the Cape Fear is a breast cancer
champion herself. She chooses to make light of the situa-tion
“When you sit with those ladies
who are having blood transfusions
and surgeries and chemotherapy,
you can’t help but have it become
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WBM october 2012
whenever possible, and believes that the women of the
Cape Fear deserve to be able to do the same. By holding
events such as the Barbeque for Boobs Cook-off and Bra
Day USA during which the group plans to use donated
bras to make a bra sculpture during a day of entertainment,
a passion. You literally are
changing people’s lives.”
—
Joy Wade
the Ta Ta Sisterhood has fun for a cause.
The organization began while Calloway was going
through treatment. She and a friend realized that
there were many women who didn’t have insurance
or were underinsured.
“We saw that there was an opening there and wanted
to help out. That’s where we decided to do the calendar,”
Calloway says. This year marks the third for the Ta Ta’s
popular calendar, which showcases professional photo-graphs
of women during their breast cancer journey.
When they asked for volunteers, the response was over-whelming.
Women as young as 21 and all the way up to
92 have been featured in the Ta Ta’s calendar.
“We don’t choose by looks or anything like that,”
Calloway says. “It’s a feeling, and their back stories.”