Story of a First Time Volunteer
A volunteer’s lesson learned:
Throw out assumptions when hoping to educate on Ovarian Cancer
By Kathy Joyce, first time volunteer
At the request of my friend Nancy Marron, I volunteered to help with the Ovarian Cancer booth at the February St. Charles Working Women’s Survival Show… and in doing so, I learned important lessons about communicating about ovarian cancer.
I stood in front of the booth and intercepted people saying, ‘May I offer you information on ovarian cancer…’ Almost everyone stop to look at the information and ask questions or express appreciation.
The symptom list was a magnet for people. A common reaction was that they were more likely to ignore the problems or seek care from a specialist rather than think about visiting their gynecologist
I stopped a middle-aged man, saying ‘You may not be concerned about ovarian cancer but you might know someone who may be…’ He first looked surprised and said ‘I just might.’ He took three sets of information: one for his mother, one for his sister and one for his wife. After his reaction, I stopped as many men as women and found equal interest, concern and curiosity among men. I also found something more – an openness among men, almost a desire, to be able to give something (and perhaps to talk about) about feminine cancers with the women in their lives. Young men took information for their girlfriends, for another friend or for a family member and were as open to the information as any woman. Another thing: almost as many men as women knew or cared about someone with feminine cancer and were willing to talk to a complete stranger about their fears, confusion and helplessness.
In my few hours of volunteering, I learned that there is no age, gender, race or limitation on the interest and concern about ovarian cancer. I also learned that few people voluntarily approach the booth but when invited to do so are interested in the many educational materials the society has made available.
It was a pleasure to volunteer at the show and, in my opinion, the St. Louis Ovarian Cancer Society is right on target with their goal to educate people about the ‘silent killer’ because there is a great interest in the information, treatment and future cure.