Bekah’s Dance for Emma
Saturday, April 9, 2016
8:30 pm – 11:30 pm
Congregation Kol Shalom
1909 Hidden Meadow Lane
Annapolis, MD 21401
Register to Dance - $15 plus $20 fundraising minimum (or just pay the whole $35)
Drinks, light refreshments, tee shirts, finisher pins and bib numbers plus other goodies will be provided.
Hi! My name is Rebekah Soreff Jones, you can call me Bekah. Thank you for taking the time to find out about “Bekah’s Dance for Emma”. The event will be a three hour dance-a-thon to raise money for childhood cancer research and I hope we can all help to find a cure so the amount of loss is lessened for all.
This January I lost my friend Emma to brain cancer at the age of 14. Emma and her family have been family friends for years. My brother was even born the day before Emma at the hospital. Emma was originally diagnosed with a grade IV glioblastoma at age 3. The doctors gave her a 10% chance to survive a year. They told her family to make arrangements for her when she passed. Miraculously, Emma was in remission within 6 months of her diagnosis and lived cancer free for 10 years. Emma was the only survivor of her clinical trial at age 3. On February 2015, it came back. The doctors said it was likely a late effect of her first radiation and the only treatment available was a second course of radiation. After the second radiation she received the maximum amount of radiation she could ever have in her life. She was stable and did well until October 2015 when it came back and metastasized to her spine. During the last several months of her life, I spent time visiting with Emma and helping her family. I feel very close to most of her family now, including her aunts and grandparents. The picture above is all of Emma’s support networks hands. As her family and friends, we each put our hands in paint and printed our handprint on to the canvas to show our support and love to Emma. We lost her January 8, 2016. She gave an amazing fight, was not a complainer at all, and an inspiration to everyone who knew her. She truly was a Superhero! Emma was a big fan of comics and superhero’s especially Batman. Batman was even a pallbearer at her funeral, and we placed action figures on top of her casket.
On April 16, 2016 I will become a Bat Mitzvah. I began thinking about what kind of mitzvah project I wanted to do to go along with my Bat Mitzvah. Doing a project with iDance4aCURE popped into my head. I am a dancer and have participated in dance-a-thons the last two years with my dance studios. iDance4aCURE is bringing the dance community together to raise funds for childhood cancer research. I began to think maybe we can celebrate Emma’s life, honor her, and raise money to help end childhood cancer, and dance all at the same time! Lisa Millar from iDance4aCURE has been a huge support in helping me launch this mitzvah project. Thank you so much Lisa! so we have created “Bekah’s Dance for Emma” , a three-hour dance-a-thon at my synagogue, Congregation Kol Shalom in Annapolis, MD.
I hope you can help support me, Emma’s family, and iDance4aCURE by helping with this mitzvah project. There are several ways you can help: if you live near Annapolis come dance with me on April 9th and have a great time while truly helping to make a difference. The minimum cost to participate as a dancer is $35. You can pay the whole amount yourself or pay $15 to register and fundraise a minimum of $20 in sponsorships from your family and friends. If you can’t make it or don’t live nearby please consider donating, no amount is too small. If you own a company or work for a company you think might be interested in supporting the event you can even be an event sponsor.
If you have any questions about the dance, please email my mom, Debra Soreff at debrasoreff@gmail.com.
Thank you for taking time to read this and I hope you can help support me in some way to make Emma’s memory a blessing and to help find a cure for cancer.
Sincerely,
Bekah