A message from your founder:
My name is Dina Sampras and I was diagnosed with Non Hodgkins Lymphoma in September of 2015. It goes without saying that it changed my life forever. A few simple words from my doctor sent me into a tailspin and suddenly I had a team of people both in and out of the hospital rallying for me on a day to day basis. It was the kindness and positivity of others that helped lift me up when I was down. One day, while receiving treatment at the cancer center, just a few short hours after I had shaved the last of my hair off, my nurse brought me a basket of hand knit hats to choose from. He said that a woman had knit them for people going through chemo and donated them to the cancer center. I cried my eyes out. Now maybe it was a mix of emotions after shaving my head, or the crazy drugs running through my system, but I felt so loved and cared for by a woman I had never even met and would never even know in person. The fact that someone cared so much about people going through such a rough journey to take her time and money to knit hats for complete strangers touched me in a way I can never explain or repay. But my hopes are to be able to touch someone in a similar way. Warriors for Hope is not just a website where people can share their journeys through cancer but it is also an organization that knits hats and scarves for the cancer centers and donates a new set as often as possible. It’s a family run operation and we have many other contributors as well. Our goal is to give back so we can touch lives just as mine was touched that day- with a simple gesture of kindness.
When I was first diagnosed with cancer I vowed not to read anything about cancer/treatments/etc on the internet for fear that I would drown in all the scary stories and articles that existed out there. I wanted to surround myself with only positivity going forward because that was the only way I was going to make it through alive. So I decided to start my own website to do just that. In an effort to bring together cancer patients, their family, and friends in a supportive environment I bring you Warriors for Hope. We are an organization founded by me, Dina Sampras, a cancer survivor from Chicago, Illinois. We encourage you to share your story as a cancer patient, survivor, family, or friend in a safe space in hopes of inspiring others to keep going. There’s no other way to say it- cancer really sucks. There’s no way to sugar coat it, no making it go away, no making the healing process quicker. But we hope that we can help make the process better. So whether you’re in the throws of it, straight out of chemo, 10,15, 20 or more years in remission, looking for a place to vent, share, express, feel, cry, linger, or just read- we invite you in. Feel free to follow the journey of this blog as it grows and evolves, and feel free to share our email in hopes of spreading awareness through people sharing their own personal stories. Email your submissions to warriorsforhope2016@gmail.com.
Sincerely and with love,
Dina Sampras
warriorsforhopeweb.wordpress.com 