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The goal of the Desert Dragons team is to extend its support network to the many women and men diagnosed with breast cancer in the Phoenix area each year. Melissa Adams was 31 when she found a lump in her breast. “You’re too young to have breast cancer,” her Pittsburgh doctor told her. Yet cancer it was, and positive for the BRCA2 genetic mutation as well. Just like that, Adams’s life changed forever. She underwent a bilateral mastectomy, reconstruction, 30 rounds of radiation, and five years of an estrogen blocker. Then came more surgeries, most of them related to complications from her radiation. “I was left searching for its meaning in my life,” she said. “Then one day, as I was pacing at my newly- appointed gynecological oncologist’s office, I saw a postcard with a picture of a boat filled with women. The message beneath read, ‘Come Paddle With Us.’ I didn’t know what kind of boat was on the postcard, but I knew I wanted to be a part of whatever it was!” Judy Pearson I Contributing Writer Hear the DESERT DRAGONS ROAR A 2ND ACT { helping is healing } Survivors paddle on FRONTDOORS MEDIA | 27 | OCTOBER 2021