Maria Fiorot

In November 2006, Maria Fiorot had her head shaved in front of a crowd of nearly 300 people. It was the final in a series of events she had organized in order to raise money for cancer research.

The crowd consisting of friends, family members, colleagues, and supporters “was just crazy,” says Maria, 48. “The energy in the room was overwhelming. It really lifted me up.”

What the crowd knew was that Maria’s five-year-old great-nephew, Trey, had died of brain cancer that March. They knew she had started raising funds nearly $17,000, in the end in his honour, and that she was donating her own hair to an organization that made wigs for kids with cancer. “Trey refused his last surgery,” says Maria. “He told his parents he wanted them to take care of the other kids at the hospital.”

What the crowd didn’t know was that Maria’s fundraising efforts had recently become much more personal: she had had a lumpectomy and been diagnosed with breast cancer two days before. She had found a lump in her breast earlier in the month, and had her diagnosis in under 3 weeks.

Those 3 weeks held some dark times, she says. “I was dead and buried so many times in my head. I kept asking myself, if there’s justice in the world, what kind of justice is this?”

But the energy of the fundraising events, the support of her family especially her partner, Jeannie and the compassion and care of her medical team got her through the darkest times. She’s now halfway through a series of 6 chemotherapy treatments, and feels “so blessed by the way people have rallied around me and supported me. Any time we’ve needed anything, it’s been provided. It’s incredible.”

These days, Maria sports a series of hand-knitted caps to protect her bald head from the northern Ontario cold. Although she never expected to lose her hair to chemotherapy, she has come to see the cancer diagnosis in a positive light.

“It’s given me some time to reflect, time I wouldn’t have taken before,” she says. During her time off work as a letter carrier, she’s been thinking about things she wants to do, like maybe open up a little restaurant. And she and Jeannie are planning a trip to Italy once the treatment is over.

The success of her fundraising efforts, the immense support and love she’s received, and her own strength have boosted “my sense of self-worth, self-love, and spirituality,” she says. “In some ways, I’m actually grateful it happened.”