The Bears and Bears Care, the team’s charitable arm, hosted its Season Opener luncheon Friday for the first time since 2019 to kick off the 2022 “Real Bears Fans Wear Pink” campaign, which is now in its 15th season.
More than 60 cancer survivors attended Friday’s event. Bears Care also hosted 13 Chicagoland organizations that serve the specific needs of breast cancer patients and survivors along with family members and caregivers.
“We’re very excited to be able to bring back the Season Opener lunch this year as part of the Real Bears Fans Wear Pink campaign,” Bears Care Director Marge Hamm said. “It’s an event that brings together people with a very difficult shared experience, but we also see what being together does for them. There’s so much energy and enthusiasm, and it’s a wonderful day to celebrate survivorship and just let them know the Bears are out there working to support cancer research and the programs that support them in their survivor’s journey.”
The Bears were represented at the luncheon by head coach Matt Eberflus and his wife Kelly Eberflus along with Katie Poles, wife of general manager Ryan Poles, and Barb McCaskey, wife of Bears chairman George H. McCaskey.
Eberflus greeted survivors and supporters at the luncheon and took photos with many of the attendees.
“It’s a great thing that the Bears have done for the last 15 years that they’re supporting cancer survivors in a lot of ways, through helping with meal deliveries, mental health services and just being supportive,” Eberflus told ChicagoBears.com. “I just think it’s a great thing the Bears organization has done and continues to do. It’s really outstanding.”
Members who help put together the Bears Care Gala, an annual event that raises funds for breast and ovarian cancer research, were also in attendance. In Hamm’s opening remarks on Friday, she emphasized the “wraparound support” the Bears provide for women before a diagnosis, during treatment and throughout survivorship.
Barb McCaskey, who has been a luncheon attendant for years, has seen the importance of this event and its ability to bring together a community of survivors and advocates.
“Bears Care is privileged to support breast cancer patients, survivors and the people who serve them on their journey of healing,” McCaskey said. “This luncheon connects women in all stages of this journey. They are lifted up being together for this time, and they lift up everyone around them. One woman today told me, ‘This experience has had many…
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