Taking Steps to Remember Her Father

During the breast cancer walk each year, there is always a moment when Jodee Mora of Sherman Oaks thinks about her dad and cries.

The 44-year-old was among 15,000 walkers who participated Sunday in “Making Strides Against Breast Cancer,” a 5K walk at the Rose Bowl, sponsored by the Los Angeles regional branch of the American Cancer Society.

The event raised about $800,000 for breast cancer research and educational programs.

On that drizzly morning, a friend placed a sticker on Mora’s back that read: “In loving memory of my father.”

“This is my cause,” said Mora, who counsels middle and high school students with disabilities for Los Angeles Unified School District.

Mora became an American Cancer Society volunteer eight years ago after losing her father to complications associated with Hodgkin’s disease, a form of cancer that affects the lymph nodes.

“I didn’t know what to do with my grief,” she said. “I needed to put it somewhere. . . . This helps keep his memory alive.”

Overwhelmed by her loss, Mora called the San Fernando Valley unit of the American Cancer Society to ask what could she do. Soon she was handing out brochures about the disease at the Glendale Galleria.

But mourning her father was only the beginning.

While Mora stepped up her volunteer work, she and her husband divorced--about the same time that she lost her Sherman Oaks apartment to the 1994 Northridge earthquake.

“There were major chunks of my life that I lost,” she said. “The only thing that was the same was my job and my car. My volunteer work kept me going.”

Serving her second term as president of the board of directors of the Valley unit of the American Cancer Society, Mora said she is encouraged by advances in breast cancer research.

“I love to hear about that,” she said. “It makes me know that we won’t have cancer one day.”

Mora’s father, Irvin, was diagnosed in 1979, the year that Jodee, then 23, moved from her hometown of Philadelphia to Los Angeles. She still loves to tell stories about her father, especially his generosity to Mora and her older brother even as the middle-class family faced difficulties making ends meet.

“He was just a regular old guy,” Mora said of her father, a toy salesman who would set aside toy samples that he would give to his children for Hanukkah. Later, when Mora was in college, she worked for him at the family’s five-and-dime store. The job gave her precious time and appreciation for his quick wit as he entertained shoppers.

“My dad was a great joke teller,” she said. “With him, his glass was always half full.”

Mora was at her father’s hospital bedside when he died Sept. 6, 1992, her mother’s 67th birthday. Fund-raising walks help keep Mora in touch with her dad’s memory while raising awareness about cancer prevention, cure and survival for both patients and family members.

Like her dad, her glass is half full. She used the 1 1/2-hour walk to catch up with and enjoy the 20 or so friends she had recruited to participate.

“I recommend [volunteering] highly for people that are going through hard times,” she said. “You get so much more than you give.”

For more information about volunteering for the American Cancer Society, call (800) ACS-2345.

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