In May 2025, my family traveled to Rhode Island to watch my mother receive an honorary doctorate in humanitarian service. My grandmother, who never misses a family milestone, stayed behind with what she brushed off as a stomach ache. She went to the emergency room instead. Hours later she came home and told us she'd been instructed to see an oncologist immediately. After months of unexplained complications, she was diagnosed with stage IV ovarian cancer at the age of 81.

My self-appointed nurse, the woman who cured every childhood fever and headache I ever had suddenly needed more care than our family could give her on our own. My mother and aunt worked tirelessly to find her the very best.

My grandmother helped raise me. She was there for middle school graduation, for high school graduation, for every milestone I can remember, and for the first time I found myself wondering whether she would be there for the next one.

She was. Thanks to Dr. Elena Ratner and the extraordinary team at Yale Oncology, she sat in the audience this past May and watched me graduate from Columbia University.

The cancer has since returned, and she is back in chemotherapy. So this isn't a story with a tidy ending, it's the reason I'm running the 2026 New York City Marathon and fundraising for Tell Every Amazing Lady. Before her diagnosis, my family knew almost nothing about ovarian cancer. Now we know how much early detection and genetic testing matter, and how many women don't get the time we've been given.

My grandmother has faced all of it with a strength I don't fully understand yet. She is my hero, and I cannot wait to run in her honor.