Area people walk to fight breast cancer

Christina Zaleski of Stratford has already won her individual war against breast cancer. She continues to fight against breast cancer, though, by walking each year in the Susan G. Komen race in Chicago, Ill., to raise money so there can one day be a cure for breast cancer. She hopes that her daughter never has to stand in front of her future children to tell them she is fighting a war against breast cancer.

Zaleski had a cancer scare five years prior to being diagnosed with breast cancer. Dr. Anna Seydel at Marshfield Medical Center performed an excisional biopsy on Zaleski. They became friends and Zaleski quit being Dr. Seydel’s patient so they could be in the same book club and do social things together.

Five years later, a physician assistant on Dr. Seydel’s breast team diagnosed Zaleski with breast cancer in late 2021.

Zaleski works as a genetic counselor at Exact Sciences’ PreventionGenetics in Marshfield. She took the Exact Sciences’ Oncotype DX Breast Recurrence Score test to help her determine whether she would benefit from chemotherapy for getting rid of breast cancer. She received a favorable return on the DNA test on her tumor so she could avoid chemotherapy. Zaleski had a bilateral mastectomy done to avoid receiving radiation treatment for her breast cancer.

She decided to participate in the Susan G. Komen walk after her diagnosis and surgery, and she imagined needing to walk by herself. She wanted to turn the negativity of cancer into something positive. Her friend, Heather Stein of Stratford, said she’d walk with her by saying, “Let’s lose our toenails together.” It turns out Zaleski would not be walking alone.

Zaleski said her team of walkers was named Hakuna Ma Tatas after the phrase that translates to “no worries.” She said the team is in it to end breast cancer and to end the worries around it.

In 2022, the team of 23 walkers in Chicago raised $33,000 for the Susan G. Komen Foundation. Zaleski’s breast surgeon, Dr. Seydel, is one of the team’s walkers. After last year’s event, the team decided to walk again this year but this time walk all three days instead of just one in Chicago. Hakuna Ma Tatas had 32 team members this year who raised over $70,000 for the Susan G. Komen Foundation. Six local breast cancer survivors, including Zaleski, Thursday rode on a bus from her house in Stratford to Chicago to walk in last weekend’s event. The bus picked up the seventh team member, who is a breast cancer survivor from New York, in Madison on the way to Chicago.

Zaleski said she and the other members of her Hakuna Ma Tatas had a great experience walking three days last weekend in Chicago.

“This experience in what they call, the pink bubble, was incredible,” she said. “Being with my tribe of Hakuna Ma Tatas was a group of ordinary people achieving something extraordinary. We laughed together, we cried together and we are stronger together.”