Morden's Cathy Dueck is the treasurer for the École Morden Middle School (EMMS) Parent Advisory Council (PAC). She has three very good reasons for people to buy raffle tickets EMMS students are selling for the Michael Pritchard Golf Tournament.  

One, $5 goes towards her kids' school for an accessible play structure, and the other two charities benefiting from the remaining $15 ticket price, Cancer Care Manitoba and South Central Cancer Resource (SCCR), are near and dear to her heart, after she was diagnosed with cancer a year ago.   

"The specific type of cancer that I just fought this past year was a pretty aggressive form of breast cancer, and I'm just so incredibly thankful for Cancer Care Manitoba. Organizations like that that keep going with Cancer Research because the specific chemo regimen I was on was only in clinical trials until recently. I was, I believe, the second person at Boundary Trails here to receive the specific chemo treatment." 

She added, "My oncologist in Winnipeg said that even as short as five years ago, if I had the specific type of cancer, my treatment would have looked a lot different, it would have been a lot longer, and more drawn out, it wouldn't have been a specifically targeted to the specific cancer. So, I'm just incredibly grateful. I started chemo in October. I was done by February, surgery in March, and now I'm just finishing immunotherapy. So, if it weren't for Cancer Research, I would still be in the thick of things. So, I'm very grateful."   

"South Central Cancer Resource has been great for me and my family. First of all, we could go in there and they did a wig fitting for me. I was able to get a wig and a bunch of different toques and so on, or beanies. And then also financially, we were in a pretty tight spot, I had actually just started school and so I had to pull out and pay back my student loans right away. And so, they've just been great with paying for mileage and accommodation when we've had to be in the city and parking and so on. And they have support groups and they're just a wonderful resource for patients and families. Just so grateful for them as well." 

Tickets are available through École Morden Middle School students and from the Michael Pritchard golf tournament board.

The draw for the tickets will be held at the July 6th Michael Pritchard Golf Tournament. 

Read more about the prizes to be won and about the EMMS play structure in the related story below. 

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