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My Niece, Michelle Rowley, started out 12 months ago raising funds for the M.S. Society. She decided to run a half-marathon every month of the year to honor her Mother who died 12 yrs ago from M.S. Her goal was to raise $10,000 for the M.S. Society. She paid all of her expenses to travel around the country to accomplish her goal. The Hackensack Lions, upon my request donated to her cause this last month which took her just over the $10,000 goal.

Michelle is my wife's (Char) sister's (Mary) daughter. Mary died 12 years ago leaving an only child, Michelle. My wife Char stays in close contact to Michelle, even though she now lives in D.C. with her husband Chris. Mary used to be the owner/editor of the McPherson County Herald newspaper in Leola S.D. We totally supported Michelle when she decided to start running for her mom.

She has run half-marathons all over the U.S. including D.C., New Orleans, Minneapolis, Charleston, Anchorage, and her final race in Las Vegas this December, all the time trying to raise funds for the M.S. Society. All donations go directly to the M.S. Society.

As a family, lots of us ran/walked with her when she ran in Minneapolis. this summer in June, seven in all, cousins, uncles and some friends too. As she closed in on her final race in Las Vegas, she was short of making her goal. I, Terry, a member of the Hackensack Lions went to our club and asked for some financial help. The club came through as they always do and donated enough to make sure Michelle reached her year-long goal.

She has had a blog that has been ongoing all year long keeping people up to date on how the running was going and where she was in her fund raising.

We are so proud of what Michelle has done in the name of finding a cure for M.S. By the way my wife Char also has M.S. so it means a lot to us.

You can follow up by reading her blog and others can donate to the M.S. cause by Sending donations to the National Capital Chapter, Attn: Farah Lawal,

18000 M Street Nw, Suite 750 South Washington, D.C. 20036. Include "My Reason 2 Run" in the memo. Her blog site is http://myreason2run.wordpress.com

You can also check out her web site by going to http://myreason2run.wordpress.com/ to see what she has done.

Thanks,

Terry and Char

Bergstrom

Hackensack, Minn.[[In-content Ad]]

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