On Saturday, March 12th, at 4 p.m. PT/7 p.m. ET, Jim Hier and Barry Cadish will host a special “Evening with Sondra Levi." It will be an opportunity to catch up, reminisce, and share stories; there will, of course, be lots of laughs! We will also spend a few minutes hearing about Sandi’s 2010 diagnosis of non-Hodgkin lymphoma and her successful battle against the disease. Finally, we'll recognize the special honor her daughter Ashley has received, and how you might be able to support the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, should you wish.
Here is the Zoom link for you to join us: ashleyzeld.in/aneveningwithsondralevi
For more information, please see: ashleyzeld.in/SL73
"Visionaries of the Year" is a philanthropic campaign--previously known as "Man & Woman of the Year"--to support blood cancer research. Since its inception in 1990, the national "of the Year" campaign has raised over $460 million for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society and its mission to fund critical research, support patients in need, advocate for better healthcare policies, and educate the public about blood cancer diseases.
Each year, LLS identifies a group of motivated and dedicated individuals in communities across the United States, and these candidates form powerful fundraising teams that campaign over the course of 10 weeks in the spring.
I'm proud to be in the first class of Visionaries, representing a more inclusive vision of fundraising to find a cure for blood cancer.
I hope to honor my mom, a non-Hodgkin lymphoma survivor, and so many friends who have been affected by blood cancer, by raising $100,000 for this important cause.
If you have time and expertise to share, consider donating that! The most important way to help is by getting the word out about this campaign!
I’m particularly trying to reach
Beyond monetary donations to this campaign, there’s another exciting fundraising component: an online auction!
Popular online auction items include celebrity meet-and-greet opportunities and other unique experiences, as well as signed sports memorabilia, music recording sessions, VIP concert tickets, luxury vacation packages, autographed authentic art and more. If you have connections to people in sports, music, travel, art, film, t.v., food, or other industries, please make the ask for our campaign!
Please reach out with any potential auction items at ashley.zeldin@gmail.com or 818-632-7088.
The Visionaries of the Year campaign kicks off March 11 (right before my birthday!) and lasts 10 weeks ‘til May 22.
So I’m not allowed to accept your money--or money from your family, friends, coworkers, neighbors--before March 11 at midnight. Then we’ve got 10 weeks to collect donations in advance of the May 22 deadline!
LLS is the largest non-profit organization in the world dedicated to fighting blood cancer.
The LLS mission is to cure blood cancer while improving quality of life for patients and families. The work of LLS comprises three pillars: research, patient support, policy and advocacy.
LLS has been around literally as long as my mom has; it was founded in 1949, the year my mom was born. Over the past 73 years, LLS has invested $1.5 billion in groundbreaking research. Critical treatment innovations have originated from LLS-funded blood cancer research, like radiation and chemotherapy, stem cell transplantation, and new targeted therapies (including CAR-T). Since 2017 LLS has helped advance 55 of 65 new treatments approved by the FDA. But what’s even more incredible is that therapies first approved for blood cancer treatment have been found to help patients with other types of cancers as varied as brain, bone, and breast cancer.
LLS provides robust resources enabling blood cancer patients to access quality, affordable and coordinated care, as well as financial and emotional support. Beyond its commitment to ensuring patients are able to access lifesaving treatments, LLS focuses on supporting families. Having been a caregiver myself, I know these efforts are crucial to patient outcomes, too.
LLS also engages in advocacy for policies at the state and federal level that remove barriers to care for cancer patients. Its efforts have resulted in increased federal research funds and more expedient review/approval processes for new therapies.
Still, more than 1.2 million Americans are living with some type of blood cancer at this very moment. Unfortunately, every 3 minutes someone is diagnosed with blood cancer and every 9 minutes someone loses that battle. More than 1/3 of non-Hodgkin lymphoma patients don’t survive past 5 years, so I’m pretty damn fortunate that my mom is still here.
Specifically, if we reach our fundraising goals, we get to name a research portfolio in my mom’s honor! We get to present her with a trophy, too! When that happens, I’ll be able to follow the research we funded through our campaign and give you updates on what our impact achieves!
I consider this campaign to be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for us to make a lasting impact and honor my mom.
Broadly, in fiscal year 2021, LLS invested 74% for its specific programs, including funding research into blood cancer treatments, providing financial assistance for blood cancer patients, and improving access to care for blood cancer. Another program component promotes patient and professional education. Here’s the link to the latest annual report: lls.org/annual-report
LLS-funded research has resulted in innovative treatment modalities for blood cancer, many of which have practical application in the treatment of other cancers.
Last year, LLS-funded research resulted in 25 FDA approvals for treatment protocols for leukemia, lymphoma, myeloma, and other blood cancers and conditions.
These approvals include two new drugs that fight diffuse large B-cell lymphoma. Approximately 77,000 new cases of non-Hodgkin lymphoma are diagnosed in the U.S. each year and DLBCL represents approximately one in three newly diagnosed cases. My mom was fortunate that her lymphoma responded to treatment with R-CHOP, but this treatment doesn’t work for everyone. That’s why it’s so exciting that LLS-supported research has resulted in two treatments for relapsed or refractory DLBCL, including a cutting-edge CAR-T gene therapy with a complete remission rate of 54%!
I thought it was strange that my mom wasn’t coming to Australia to see me receive my master’s degree. It felt fortuitous that my hooding ceremony coincided with her spring break. She had been so eager to visit me in Sydney, and then she wasn’t. So sometime in March 2010 I knew something was not-quite-right with my mom.
For weeks, my mom had been feeling exhausted all the time. Then in mid-April she noticed swelling on the left side of her neck. She finally went to her doctor, who had her come back for bloodwork. In the meantime, he had consulted other doctors who suggested an MRI, too. On viewing the imaging her doctor referred her immediately for a biopsy.
I arrived in Los Angeles on April 24, 2010. My intention was to visit my mom, complete jury duty, renew my visa, then return to Australia; I had a grand life waiting for me there. But when I landed stateside, my plans changed in an instant.
On April 26, 2010, my mom was diagnosed with stage 3 diffuse large B-cell non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a very aggressive form of blood cancer that had spread throughout her body. She wanted to postpone treatment ‘til the end of the semester--after all, her students were counting on her!--but her oncologist and I insisted she start chemo immediately. So she was admitted to West Hills Hospital on her 61st birthday. When she was discharged from the hospital after her first round of chemo, she went back to school the very next day!
My mom taught all through her treatment--wearing a wig that made her look like Mary Tyler Moore--and she prepared comprehensive lesson plans for the days she was absent from school during chemo. That was my mom’s final semester of her 40-year teaching career.
Throughout the summer and fall, my mom wrote innumerable recommendation letters for her former students. Even after her scans were all clear, her oncologist recommended she keep taking chemo, just in case. After two more cycles, her body couldn’t take it anymore. She was transported by ambulance back to the hospital. That’s when her oncologist decided she’d had enough.
After remission came recovery. My mom needed physical therapy, as her legs were so weak she hadn’t been able to walk upstairs to her bedroom in many months. Her PT was endlessly amused by her band t-shirts, ranging from Jimi Hendrix to Johnny Cash, from Pink Floyd to Red Hot Chili Peppers.
That October my mom experienced major breakthroughs. For one, her sense of taste returned! I’ll never forget how elated she was that a strawberry tasted like a strawberry again! No more metallic-tasting Pepsi! Some new developments were more irritating. While at the movies one afternoon, her scalp started feeling itchy under her wig. But that was good news: that meant her hair was growing back! The most momentous milestone was when I convinced her to come with me to USC v Stanford at the Coliseum (unfortunately the 16th-ranked Cardinal beat our Trojans with a FG on the final play). I was so proud of her tolerating that much walking and that many stairs!
My mom had been concerned that she wouldn’t be able to go to USC basketball games--she was and remains a season-ticket holder--but navigating the Coliseum gave her the confidence that she could do anything! By March Madness, my mom was rocking the Jamie Lee Curtis pixie look. But she never did style her hair in mohawk like she promised!
My mom was most excited that she had hair, but I was just glad that she was still here!
I’m blessed to be able to say my mom has been in remission for 11 years!
When my mom was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin lymphoma in 2010, it was stage 3--that’s pretty serious--and she had to have intense R-CHOP chemo every 3 weeks. Fortunately, it worked!
Her type of blood cancer, diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, has a 62% 5-year survival rate in the United States. However, even with rituximab (that’s the R in R-CHOP), an innovation made possible by LLS-funded research, there’s still a 40% relapse rate; unfortunately, up to half of patients with DLBCL stop responding to R-CHOP or relapse after achieving complete response. At that point, salvage chemotherapy only works in about one-third of patients. So we’ve been very fortunate!
Now that it’s been over a decade, we can safely say my mom is in continuous complete remission! She may have lost a step as a result of this ordeal, but she hasn’t lost her wit or charm!
However, the past two years have been very isolating for my mom; I’m an only child, and my dad passed in 2005. My mom’s original post-retirement plan was to downsize from her home in Calabasas and travel around the country, visiting with her former students along the way.
But life kept getting in the way. Then, only weeks after she moved into a condo in the SFV, the pandemic hit.
After being nominated for the Visionary of the Year campaign for the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society, I got to talking to some of my mom’s former students who she’d kept in touch with. They wanted to spread the word to their classmates from their high school days. So I got the idea to try to reconnect my mom with other students she’s mentioned to me over the years.
Ever since I started getting my mom in touch with her former students earlier this year, I’ve seen a definite change in her. She’s been heartened to hear about their lives, their accomplishments, their families. She’s spent countless hours on the phone reminiscing with students from the ‘70s, ‘80s, ‘90s and ‘00s, and I’ve not seen her laugh this much in years!
My mom and I would love for you to join us at the virtual Kick-Off Celebration hosted by LLS this Thursday, March 10, at 6:30 p.m. Pacific! You can register online at bit.ly/voyko22!
We’re also collaborating with my mom’s former students to hold a series of virtual cocktail parties to reminisce about my mom’s career at Kennedy and Chatsworth! Please reach out to me at ashley.zeldin@gmail.com or 818-632-7088 if you’d like to help coordinate an event!
There may be an opportunity to celebrate with us in-person--if the pandemic allows--at the LLS Grand Finale Celebration on May 22 at the Taglyan Complex in Hollywood. So watch this space!