Walk for Leukemia

Tools

By Nicole Grigg

Story Published: Sep 12, 2011 at 10:25 PM MDT

Story Updated: Sep 13, 2011 at 1:05 PM MDT

BILLINGS - A Billings woman is doing all she can to bring awareness to the disease that took her husband's life.

"I recently lost my husband to leukemia on valentines day of this year,” said Jen Nave.

Nave is doing everything she can to keep the promise she made to her husband by making others aware of the disease that took his life much too soon. At the age of 30 Patrick Nave was diagnosed with leukemia, a cancer that targets the blood.

He waged a ferocious battle for two years before succumbing to the deadly disease. “When he passed away our youngest was two months old,” said Nave.

Now, Nave is trying to bring a nationwide walk called, "Light the Night Walk" to Billings. She will hold the first walk of its kind in the Magic City on October 14th at seven p.m. at North Park.

Nave said her husband was always the life of the party brought a smile to everyone's face, even during the hardest of times.

The newlywed couple was determined to fight. They had plans to travel the country in search of new treatments, but Patrick got an infection that ended his battle, “it didn't hit me until probably until the day before he passed away,” she said.

“Sometimes I’m okay, sometimes I’m not. It just kind of depends on. The first couple of months it depended on the minute, now that I’m a little bit further out, depends on the hour,” said Nave.

Nave wants to encourage people to become bone marrow donors. She said her husband likely would have survived if he'd have found a match. At the walk, she will have sign up sheets to become a donor.

Money raised for this years walk will go to research and support for people battling cancer.

Billings is registered under the Boise chapter for the walk with all the donations going to that chapter. Nave hopes that there will be enough interest in Billings to have organizers book a walk next year.

On Saturday September 17th Nave will hold a garage sale with proceeds going towards the walk. Nave is asking for any donations. The address for the garage sale is 2215 Lyndale Lane, from eight a.m. to four p.m.

You have indicated this comment should be removed.

Close

The comment has been submitted for review. Thank you .

Pamela Ann Beck said on Thursday, Sep 22 at 5:01 PM

Please can I get contact info to help with this. My email is: www.spreeze@gmail.com.

SkeeterJorgensen said on Tuesday, Sep 13 at 9:02 AM

A great interview, I know this will help Jen in keeping her promise to Pat.

Add a comment

Name:

Comment: 1000 Characters Left

KULR-8 News, Sports, Weather and its affiliated companies are not responsible for the content of comments posted or for anything arising out of use of the above comments or other interaction among the users. We reserve the right to screen, refuse to post, remove or edit user-generated content at any time and for any or no reason in our absolute and sole discretion without prior notice, although we have no duty to do so or to monitor any Public Forum.

Your Weather Authority

Icon
Current Temp 60.0 °F
Partly Cloudy
Wind : South at
5.8 mph
Humidity : 53 %
Pressure : 30.01 in
More Weather

Party America Sky Cam

More Weather

On Demand

YouNews

This content requires the latest Adobe Flash Player and a browser with JavaScript enabled. Click here for a free download of the latest Adobe Flash Player.