Jean Mackie has often felt powerless in the face of breast cancer. She has witnessed the disease take root in many friends and five years ago she never would have imagined it would take the life of her friend Racheal (for whom Runway SoCal began). When speaking about Rachael, Jean lights up saying, “Rachael was just plain fun. The world was robbed. She was kicking it and then suddenly, her life was done.”

For Laura Gromis, family has been at the center of her life for as long as she can remember. She grew up with her grandparents right down the street, so when her maternal grandmother, Dawn, was diagnosed with breast cancer at 55, it came as a shock. Receiving a single mastectomy and hormone therapy, the cancer went into remission, only to return later, requiring a second mastectomy and further treatment. It was at this time that Laura’s grandparents came to live with her family full time. The time spent together strengthened the family’s bond even further: “they were our only close family, so to us they were everything.”