Day 24 of 25 DAYS OF HUGGING:
Christina was the second of three daughters born to Benny & Maria Pierorazio. Maria was a doting mother and a role model in every sense to her daughter Christina. Maria taught her daughter compassion and empathy, along with how to be a mother and how to run a family. Any time Christina was faced with a problem, inevitably she would say:
“my mother would do this…”
Maria and Benny Pierorazio on their wedding day
Maria was THE driving force in Christina’s life.
While there were many lessons Christina learned from her mother, Maria’s final lesson for her daughter was to teach her how to handle illness and death with all the grace only a true angel could impart.
For when Christina’s suffering became unbearable and when the doctors put her on hospice, Christina kept the picture of her mother on a table or the nightstand right in front of her where she could see her mother and feel her counsel.
Christina was driven to help rid this world of that awful breast cancer that took her mother some 28 years earlier. She offered counsel and encouragement to others suffering from the disease and always advocated for screening. She was a huge supporter of the Lynn Sage Breast Cancer Center at Northwestern Memorial, and received all her screenings there after a false scare years ago. She took great pride in strides we were making against that awful killer, and quietly relished the number of other young women who would now have joy of their mothers with them because we are making such progress against this form of cancer.
This sense of purpose against cancer is what motivates all of us involved with CCCF.
For more information on Lynn Sage and all the great work they do, please visit: https://lynnsagefoundation.org.
And of course, please consider a donation to CCCF: www.celebratingchristina.org/donate
One day, one goal, one hug.
