AKRON, Ohio – An Akron mom’s relentless effort to raise money to fight brain cancer is being sparked by her passion, a strong will, her relationship with old friends and new ones.
And beer.
It doesn’t take long to see Bunny Oldham is a ball of fire, a driven person whose life in the last two years has been motivated by seeking a cure for brain cancer. Like many passion projects, it’s personal at its core: Bunny’s daughter, Molly, was diagnosed with stage 3 cancer the day she was set to leave for college in 2019.
Only a few hundred people in the United States are diagnosed with her cancer - anaplastic ependymoma, which affects the central nervous system and grows quickly. It’s rare, it’s aggressive, and it demands a fight.
Molly is 20. She was 18 when she was diagnosed, ready to head to the University of North Carolina-Greensboro to study musical theater in a highly competitive program that accepted only six students in the nation.
What followed was brain-cancer surgery at Akron Children’s Hospital and subsequent radiation at University Hospitals in Cleveland. Molly has dealt with the initial, shocking diagnosis in an extraordinary positive way while her mother will not be stopped in raising money to combat the disease.
‘Oh my gosh, how is this happening to me?’
“It’s kind of crazy,” Molly said, looking back. “I don’t remember about two weeks of my life, which is kind of scary when you think about it. When I was diagnosed with a brain tumor, when I had surgery, when I was prepped for all that - I don’t remember any of it. The first day I woke up and started to remember who I am and what was going on was also the day I was diagnosed with cancer. It was a huge hit over the head – ‘Oh my gosh, how is this happening to me? I can’t believe this.’ "
She says that day – Aug. 15, 2019 – was like waking up “after a really, really long nap.” Her oncologist came in and delivered the words no one wants to hear.
She processed what happened and took solace in her mom and two sisters being there and knowing " ‘Wow, I feel like I’m starting over,’ but it’s also so nice to know what was wrong with me, and I can fix it.”
“She worked her butt off and made it to school next semester,” Bunny said.
But Molly started having seizures.
Doctors in Akron said they couldn’t immediately do anything more because Molly had been radiated 15 months before, and 24 months is needed between treatments, Bunny said.
“We went to Cleveland, we went to Columbus, we went to St. Jude’s (Children’s Research Hospital). We went all over the place, and there was nothing they could do. … Our hands were tied. What we were going to do is maybe have surgery, wait for it to come back, and that is not something a 20-year-old wants to hear,” Bunny said.
But Duke University Medical Center, a top brain-cancer research hospital, accepted her.
“It was so aggressive,” Bunny said. “When we found it Jan. 4 it was the size of a pea. When they operated it was the size of two large grapes 18 days later – very, very aggressive.”
Molly was willing to endure risks: She could have lost her eyesight, mobility and her hearing – the latter especially detrimental as well as scary for a singer.
“We had to agree to all that,” Bunny said. “We went for it.”
Before Thanksgiving, Molly received clear scans. She regained mobility, and her eyes are recouping.
“She considers herself one of the lucky ones,” Bunny said.
“Lucky” might seem like a strange word to use for a young woman who was on the cusp of starting college and figuring out who she is in life.
“It was really easy for me to feel sorry for myself and be upset because cancer sucks,” Molly said. It’s a huge setback, it’s a horrible disease that took a lot of things away from me. But I also am so lucky to just be alive. I am lucky to breathe on my own. I am so fortunate to recognize those things because not everyone can. I have always been a positive person; I got it from my mom.”
She added: “It was easy to find silver linings for me.”
She even came out of surgery singing Ben Platt’s “Ease My Mind,” which she says has continued to be an anthem during her recovery. The “Dear Evan Hansen” star eventually found out about Molly and sent a video message. She sang with her nurses. And in May she was on “The View,” where she and Bunny were introduced to Colin Gerner.
In this photo illustration, the Gerner brothers are captured during a race. Colin had the photos edited together. GJ is on the left, and Colin is on the right. Colin Gerner is carrying his brother’s legacy by fighting for brain-cancer patients, raising money through stachestrong.org.
A helping hand
Gerner has two things in common with Bunny. They both have driven personalities, and they both understand having a loved one with brain cancer.
Gerner is a founder of stachestrong.org, a non-profit that raises money for research to fight brain cancer. He defines his role as “CEO and intern all at once.”
StacheStrong is an all-volunteer-run, 501-c3 passion project. He was on “The View” during Brain Cancer Research Awareness Month. One of the show’s hosts at the time was Meghan McCain, daughter of the late Sen. John McCain, who died of brain cancer in 2018.
“Bunny and I hit it off immediately,” said Gerner, who is from the Binghamton, New York, area and lives in New York City. “She realized I am not in this for any personal gain. I lost my best friend, my brother, to this disease.”
Gerner started #BrewStacheStrong with his brother, GJ – George John – Gerner, who was diagnosed with glioblastoma when he was 28. He was 30 when he died.
Glioblastoma is a vicious type of brain tumor. Only 5 percent of patients are expected to live five years.
“Quite frankly, when he was diagnosed, we didn’t have a ‘StacheStrong’ to turn to,” Gerner said. “We felt alone in that sense. … We’re somehow considered lucky in a world where your 30-year-old brother lives 25 months, and I just refuse to accept that. That’s why I do what I do with StacheStrong.”
He has one driving motivation: “More just simply has to be done.”
And that’s where beer comes in.
Mary MacDonald is executive director of the Ohio Craft Brewers Association. Bunny Oldham and MacDonald were college roommates. Oldham and Colin Gerner are reaching out to breweries across the country in a fundraising initiative to fight brain cancer.Marc Bona, cleveland.com
Brewing for a cause
Through a friend, Gerner connected with Oskar Blues Brewery. He even helped brew a beer with the Colorado-based brewery.
“We put the mission of StacheStrong and my brother’s story behind it, and we crushed it,” he said.
Here’s how it works: Each participating brewery chooses one of its beers, raises the pint price by a buck, and donates that dollar. Gerner sends a mustache-image logo for breweries to use as a standard look. Funds raised go directly to research trials or projects that need funding.
Then came the pandemic.
“I realized that our strength of in-person events was kind of going to take a bit of a hit, and we had to think on out feet and do things differently if we were still going to raise the funds we had planned to raise,” Gerner said. “So we took this concept of BrewStacheStrong – putting ‘brew’ in front of our name as a catchy hashtag and campaign - and started to cold call and visit breweries in January 2021. I had hoped we could get 30 breweries on board, get my training wheels behind me, and learn how to do all of this.
“We ended up with 205 breweries in 37 states and over 300,000 pints brewed.”
The effort, Gerner said, “is half a million to a million dollars pretty soon. Breweries do what? They brew beer, they have a wonderful environment, that’s what they love to do. What do we do? We inspire, we raise money for brain-cancer research. All net proceeds go straight to research.”
Gerner envisions having “400 to 500 breweries” contributing to the initiative fueled mostly through simply getting the word out via texts and calls after hours.
“You watch these individuals come together, as simple as having a beer and raising a pint to someone who is either fighting or who has lost. You watch as a community comes together, you take a step back and realize that your misfortune has allowed these people to have a platform, an outlet to come together though #BrewStacheStrong. … You look at a campaign that has really built a community. It’s a lot more than a beer at this point.”
Gerner shies from credit and remains focused on the end game.
“I’m not in a competition to find a cure; I’m in a collaboration to make sure we find a cure,” he said.
And breweries aren’t the only ones collaborating in the project.
Molly Oldham and Pete Meadows, on the sidelines of the Meadows Turkey Bowl. In the past several years, both have been diagnosed with different forms of brain cancer. Part of the proceeds from the annual Thanksgiving charity football game in Hinckley goes to fund research to fight brain cancer.
Help in Ohio
Since their chance meeting on “The View,” Gerner and Bunny have become pals.
“She’s an absolute ball of energy. … She reminds me why I do this,” he said. “There’s a mom whose daughter, at an even younger age than my brother, was faced with (the response) basically after the first recurrence - ‘We can’t treat you’. And through all these roundabout ways (she) finds us, and we’re able to give her a platform and an effort where she feels she is aiding in her daughter’s fight. That is so powerful.”
Bunny’s initial reaction about the philanthropic brewery component in Gerner’s fight against brain cancer was: “I can’t help you; my kid’s not even 21.”
But then it hit her.
“What if we helped you with the Ohio breweries?” she asked him.
The serendipitous lining to the story is that Bunny’s roommate at Miami University was Mary MacDonald, who is executive director of the Ohio Craft Brewers Association.
The two lived in the same dorm but did not know each other until, of all things, a Christmas shopping trip. They ended up sitting next to each other for the 45-minute drive and bonded.
“We hit it off and spent the whole day together,” MacDonald said.
Their senior year, they were roommates and have been close friends since. They were in each other’s weddings. They supported each other through divorces. So it was no surprise to hear that MacDonald stayed with Bunny in the hospital to make sure her friend slept and ate while her daughter was being treated.
“She’s a pretty wonderful person,” MacDonald said. “She’s a force of nature.”
MacDonald is a force, too. The OCBA lobbies on behalf of Ohio’s more than 350 craft breweries, working to promote an industry that in 2018 alone generated more than 8,300 jobs, $124 million in local and state tax dollars and $53 million in federal taxes. In a few years, she has overseen an organization that has encouraged, and realized, tremendous growth.
At its core, though, are brewers – creative folks who maintain a strong communal – and giving – spirit.
MacDonald connected Bunny with the OCBA. Bunny is now a member of the organization. MacDonald shies from any potential conflict of interest, so it’s up to Bunny to reach out to the state’s breweries.
“She’s never met a stranger, immediately is just open and forthright and warm about everything,” MacDonald said of her friend.
The more beer poured will translate to more money for brain-cancer research. And it’s coming at a critical time with the pandemic slowing the flow of dollars into non-profits.
Bunny describes the fiscal-donation process: Envision three buckets for researchers. The government gives money with stipulations on what to study. The pharmaceutical industry funnels dollars but ties the research to a specific drug. Then there is the third group - private, anything raised by a hospital, for instance.
“That’s where the doctors can decide, that’s where innovation can come up,” Bunny said.
That means research – trials, tests and searches for solutions and cures. But it’s also the bucket that Covid kicked the hardest. Private money, personal donations and fundraisers all decreased.
“They’re stuck,” Bunny said.
So Bunny and Gerner reached out to Duke to helped with that third bucket.
“That is what Colin does,” Bunny said. “Colin raises money and gives it straight to the doctors.”
The BrewStacheStrong effort, as Bunny sees it, will “raise a lot of money and it’s going to raise a lot of awareness.”
“Quite frankly, usually when you raise money, you appeal to the heartstrings of the women - the moms, the women. You put a picture of Molly with her head bolted (down) right before she had radiation. All the moms cry and say, ‘What can I do?’ But BrewStacheStrong, you’re appealing to the guys, the dads – ‘Drink more beer, raise more money’, and it works.”
Families often feel like they are in the shadows of what their loved ones are going through, said Bunny, a single mom who works in business development for a computer company in Akron.
“I really think that’s why # BrewStacheStrong resonates with the dads,” Bunny said. “They feel like they can do something.”
May is the target date to get beers in cans in retail distribution.
With more than 8,000 breweries operating in the United States, Gerner sees opportunity.
“There’s so many breweries,” he said. “Basically, if we can hit just 1 to 2 percent of breweries, we can raise a million dollars. I’m a CPA. It’s such an easy model.”
Easy or not, Bunny is not wavering in her commitment to raise funds.
“This is now our passion and driving force,” she said.
Spend a second with Molly and Bunny, and immediately you see the mother-daughter bond over their vivacious personalities. On Thanksgiving, the two attended the Meadows Turkey Bowl in Hinckley, the pickup football game that raises thousands of dollars for charity and has earmarked money for brain-cancer research. Pete Meadows - one of the players and son of the game’s co-founder, Mike Meadows - was diagnosed with brain cancer in 2020.
Molly and Pete met at the game, the two easing into conversation like old friends.
“It’s always really fun and really easy to interact with people who kind of understand a little of what I’ve been through,” Molly said.
#brewstachestrong aims to promote brain-cancer awareness as well as raise money.
Moving forward
Money from stachestrong.org has funded more than a dozen research projects and raised more than $1,750,000. It recently launched the Glioma Connectome Project, a collection of neurosurgery centers to push for clinical research and treatment for glioblastoma.
Gerner and Bunny stay in touch and talk regularly.
For his part, Gerner calls it an honor to “fight alongside those who are still with us and fight against brain cancer.”
This year so far, 50 breweries nationwide have committed to the StacheStrong effort, Gerner said. Bunny calls the response from breweries “fantastic.”
“We’re doing well,” she said. “The second we can talk to them about it, everybody has a story about cancer. They are interested and onboard 100 percent.”
The University of North Carolina-Greensboro awarded Molly a scholarship for her remaining two years. Bunny says Molly’s scans in October show “no evidence of disease.”
“We’re cautiously optimistic. She is still struggling with seizures. … Although it’s not the end of the road for us with treatment, right now she is cancer free,” Bunny said.
“You know, I feel great right now,” said Molly, who turns 21 in July. “I think there’s always going to be some PTSD and there’s always going to be side effects from my cancer and that’s something we deal with one day at a time. I finished my first semester of this year and I’m home now, I’m with my best friends at home and I love my friends at school. Everything is looking up, and it feels like it’s going to be a great semester next year, too.”
As Bunny says: “She’s rocking out. If anyone is going to beat it, it’s her.”
More info
• To learn more about the non-profit #BrewStacheStrong, or to donate to the cause, go to https://www.stachestrong.org/.
• Bunny Oldham also suggests those who want to help donate to Stewart’s Caring Place, 3501 Ridge Park Dr., Fairlawn, 330-836-1772. Email: [email protected]/.
• Here’s more on Pete Meadows and his diagnosis: Cancer survivor’s inspiring story brings Meadows Turkey Bowl’s mission close to home
I am on cleveland.com’s life and culture team and cover food, beer, wine and sports-related topics. If you want to see my stories, here’s a directory on cleveland.com. Bill Wills of WTAM-1100 and I talk food and drink usually at 8:20 a.m. Thursday morning. Twitter: @mbona30.
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