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Caren Gorenberg

Caren Gorenberg
Posted on: 04/13/2016

Caren Gorenberg is on a journey for lung cancer answers. With advanced stage disease, she is frustrated that the nation’s biggest cancer killer does not receive top research dollars. In 2010, Caren led runners and walkers on a 5-K event that started at The Cancer Center and ended at the Duck Pond at North Florida Regional Medical Center. Funds raised went to the Bonnie J. Addario Lung Cancer Foundation for lung cancer research. That first event was a great success, and events in 2011 and 2012 have been even more successful.

Caren has an amazing spirit and sense of humor. She calls her event Run Amuck with the Duck. The namesake for the event is a small stuffed duck who has accompanied her during several years of treatment. Caren’s story is inspiring, and she is always willing to share it because it may help others. Grateful to be alive, Caren dreams the annual event will help make that possible for other patients with lung cancer. Plans for the 2013 Run Amuck with the Duck have already begun, and the date for the event is confirmed as March 9, 2013. Mark your calendars! As always, Run Amuck with the Duck will begin at The Cancer Center.

Words from Caren

Crackers the Duck joined our family when my son Pete began medical school, and they earned their degrees side by side. Crackers generally makes his home in San Francisco, though he displayed early on a penchant for world travel when he stowed away in my luggage on a trip to Italy and France. He travels widely and has been spotted riding a camel at the pyramids of Giza, cavorting with penguins at the tip of South America and most recently on the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. (Note: he is never photo-shopped!)

Crackers was present when I had my lung surgery. After my diagnosis, he returned to Gainesville via UPS, clad in his signature green scrubs, carrying an IV pole hung with my chemotherapy medications, and a note that said, “Tell Dr. Gordan I’ll have what she’s having.”

He has become a popular figure at the oncology office, where he has accompanied me for every one of my every-three-week chemotherapy sessions for the past three years.

Like me, Crackers is aware that the clock is ticking; the medication that I am on eventually stops working. Researchers are closing in on that next step. And I am a perpetual optimist…I think 2013 has a great ring to it!

Caren Gorenberg
Posted on: 04/13/2016

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