Running for hope: Family celebrates late wife, mother's life and witness of faith

Annual 5k to honor 'Amazing Amanda' Cavanaugh, local woman whose cancer battle and example of grace inspired many

FARMINGTON — After Amanda Cavanaugh was diagnosed with melanoma, she invited friends and family to walk with her in the KDB Melanoma 5k to support the AIM at Melanoma Foundation. Each year, they rallied around her and the event with prayer, hugs and donations, raising $194,148 as a group for melanoma research since their first 5k in 2015.

Cavanaugh passed away in 2020, but her husband, daughters and supporters continue to walk each October to carry on her legacy of hope and faith.

Amanda’s disease was first discovered in 2009 when her sister, Julia, issued an urgent request to family after a trip to the dermatologist found early-stage melanoma. Julia urged them to get a full body skin check, knowing that her father had also contended with melanoma in the past. According to the American Cancer Society, roughly 10% of melanoma patients have a family history of the disease.

A skin check with a dermatologist that fall revealed a small mole on Amanda’s foot which was found to be melanoma. Doctors removed the tissue, and she returned for bi-annual skin checks. In 2014, at a routine appointment, more melanoma was discovered, and this time it had moved into her lymph nodes. Amanda’s battle with cancer had now become a daily fight.

As she underwent multiple surgeries, she prayed with her husband, Jason, and shared her diagnosis with only a few close family and friends. The couple chose not to tell their daughters, ages 4 and 9 at the time, or share with their larger school and parish community at Our Lady of Sorrows in Farmington.

“Hindsight is 20/20, but it seemed like the right thing at the time,” Jason Cavanaugh said. “Everyone who knew Amanda knew her resoluteness. She was hopeful, and she didn’t want to make anyone worry, especially the girls.”

In 2015, Amanda learned that her cancer had moved to stage 4 advanced melanoma. The couple decided it was time to tell their daughters and to reach out to friends and family for prayers.

“We realized we were missing out on the ability to ask others for help with things like meals and getting the kids to school, but most importantly, to open up the grace of prayer for Amanda,” Jason said.

Amanda, Jason, some family members and close friends had walked the 2015 KDB Melanoma 5k a few months before learning her cancer had advanced. For the 2016 walk, 150 people signed up to join the “Amazing Amanda” team in support of their friend, wife, mom, sister, daughter, and fellow parishioner. Amanda’s team made up one quarter of all the participants that day.

The years that followed were filled with appointments and treatments, including a clinical trial at MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas.

Amanda and Jason embarked on a group pilgrimage to Italy in 2017 with their associate pastor, Fr. Mario Amore, and former associate pastor, Fr. Paul Snyder. At St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, Amanda received the sacrament of the anointing of the sick at the tomb of St. Peter. In 2018, they traveled to Lourdes, France, for a powerful pilgrimage with the Order of Malta.

“Of course, you go there with the outside hope for a miracle of physical healing, but going there gave us spiritual healing,” Jason said. “It struck me while I was there that everything really will be fine no matter what the outcome, as long as we have faith. Our job as husbands and wives is to get our spouse to heaven, and as long as that happens, everything will be fine — as hard as it is.”

Through it all, Amanda maintained her trademark sense of humor and found strength in prayer. She updated friends and family on Caring Bridge, ending almost every journal entry with, “God is good all the time, all the time God is good.”

In the spring of 2020, Amanda began experiencing serious side effects from her treatments. Jason remembers the appointment with the oncologist the Tuesday following an emergency room visit that Mother’s Day.

“The doctor sat down and told us, ‘It’s time to start focusing on the quality of your life and not the quantity,’” Jason recalled.

A few days later, friends and family gathered outside the Cavanaugh home to pray a rosary with Amanda. Because of the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions for large gatherings, friends used flour to make marks on the grass six feet apart for people to stand on. Their friend, Fr. Mark Livingston, brought Jesus in the monstrance for outdoor adoration and benediction.

One week after learning that Amanda had exhausted her treatment options, Jason went to look at a boat that was for sale. The couple had talked about purchasing one for a long time to use at his parents’ cottage. The next day, he took Amanda to test drive the boat; they bought it that night so that Amanda could spend her remaining days making new memories with her family.

On Oct. 31, 2020, Amanda passed into eternal life surrounded by her family at home. She was 42.

In her obituary, written lovingly by her sister, Julia, Amanda was remembered as a wife who “kept the promises of Jesus Christ and her trust in the Lord at the forefront of her life and marriage.” She continued, “While many things reflected Amanda’s beautiful character, the most brilliant part of her legacy will be the two daughters she loved with all her heart … A mother who was ever present, Amanda coached Brenna’s middle school volleyball team, volunteered with Nora’s Girl Scout troop, and taught the girls how to make her signature brownies.”

Since Amanda’s passing, the KDB Melanoma 5k took on a new meaning. Unlike previous years when Amanda walked beside them, those who signed up with the Amazing Amanda team now walk to celebrate her life and to fight for a cure.

This year’s walk/run — the 10th for the Amazing Amanda team — will take place on Oct. 13 at Kensington Metro Park. Ninteen-year-old Brenna will come home from college in West Virginia to walk with the team. She looks forward to carrying on the tradition of the walk as she carries her mom’s legacy in her heart.

“My mom always tried to keep a positive attitude for my sister and me, and that served as a good example to us for life. Her willingness to accept God’s plan helped me accept it, too,” Brenna said. “She was very selfless, and she always wanted the focus to be on God.”

Jason aims to live out the principles his wife taught him, and he hopes others who are inspired by her story do, too. One of Amanda’s favorite songs was Tim McGraw’s “Live Like You Were Dying.”

“I think a lesson we can learn from Amanda is to cherish everyday moments, knowing that each day is a gift,” Jason said. “In the midst of the grind, it’s so easy to lose sight of that. When I’m making waffles to put in the freezer for Nora for breakfast, I try to remember that there’s beauty and grace in those everyday things.”

In the end, Jason says, Amanda won the race.

“Amanda never wanted anyone to say she lost the battle. She would say she didn’t lose anything," Jason said. "She knew the promises of Jesus, and being with him in heaven is not a loss.”