‘None of us are getting out of here alive’
Lehigh Valley Realtors group takes advice from 20/20 anchor
Amy Robach had her oncologist schedule her chemotherapy treatments around the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.
To Russia she went for ABC News, armed with a camera crew and a gallon-bag of antibiotics, three months after she was diagnosed with breast cancer.
Through eight treatments, she didn’t miss a day of work.
“I didn’t want to let cancer take one more thing away from me,” she said Thursday, minutes before walking onto a stage in Bethlehem to encourage a room full of real estate agents to take all of their vacation days.
The Greater Lehigh Valley Realtors Group hosted Robach, co-anchor of ABC’s “20/20” and contributor to “Good Morning America,” as the keynote speaker at its seventh annual Signature Event held in the Musikfest Cafe at the Steelstacks.
Robach is a departure from the group’s previous lineup, which included real estate reality stars like “Million Dollar Listing” star Fredrik Eklund and HGTV’s “Property Brothers,” and football moguls like Penn State football coach James Franklin and former pro running back Emmitt Smith.
But for GLVR marketing director Tammy Lerner, beaming brightly in lavender from head to toe, Robach’s message was long overdue.
Lavender is the color representing all cancers. Her cousin died of oncological melanoma on Lerner’s birthday last year.
“I can’t believe that there’s somebody here who hasn’t been impacted by cancer,” Lerner said.
Nearly 400 people within the real estate and broader community bid on spa getaways, game tickets and dinners for two in a silent auction to benefit the Cancer Support Community of the Greater Lehigh Valley and the Women’s 5K Classic. Later in the night, they bid loudly in a live auction of Penn State memorabilia signed by New York Giants football star and Coplay native Saquon Barkley.
In between, they listened to Robach tell her story, her backdrop a hand-made heart of roses.
These days Robach does at least 15 public speaking engagements a year, she said. But before revealing her diagnosis on Good Morning America in November of 2013, telling her own story, as a journalist, never seemed appropriate.
Journalism wasn’t even her first career choice. She wanted to be a theater actor, despite her stage fright.
In college, her first journalism assignment was to interview the father of a woman who had accidentally overdosed on ecstasy. She told him if sharing this story could save one life, it would be worth it.
She remembers the quiver in his lower lip as he told her, “Ok, I’ll do it.”
“There’s no script that could ever have the impact this does,” Robach said.
It was the same logic GMA anchor Robin Roberts used to convince her to receive a mammogram on live television, she said on stage.
After that mammogram saved her life, there was no hesitation about becoming the story anymore.
“I knew I had to pay it forward,” Robach said. “It wasn’t even a question for me.”
Robach stayed on stage to present awards to two Lehigh Valley area doctors, selected by the cancer organizations benefiting from the night’s proceeds for their work advancing cancer research.
This is the first year the realtors group has given the Catalyst for Cancer Award, and the recipients were Tricia Kelley, a surgical oncologist at St. Luke’s, and Suresh Nair, a hematologist and medical oncologist at Lehigh Valley Health Network.
Since Robach’s diagnosis, the daily group workouts, the ketogenic diet, the five-day hike up Mount Kilimanjaro to celebrate five years cancer-free, have all been for fortifying her body should cancer strike again.
It was no wonder to her that the three survivors she interviewed after their miracle plane landing on the Hudson River had also summited Kilimanjaro: they had all experienced moments where they thought they might die.
“It doesn’t have to be 19,000 feet in the sky,” she told the crowd Thursday night. “But we all have to find our own summits.”
“None of us are getting out of here alive.”
Morning Call reporter Kayla Dwyer can be reached at 610-820-6554 or at kdwyer@mcall.com.