[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 161 (2015), Part 12]
[House]
[Pages 16551-16552]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                     BREAST CANCER AWARENESS MONTH

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. The Chair recognizes the gentleman from 
Texas (Mr. Olson) for 5 minutes.
  Mr. OLSON. Mr. Speaker, this is the last week of National Breast 
Cancer Awareness Month. Before it ends, I would tell the American 
people about two amazing women from Sugar Land, Texas, two good friends 
of my family, two women who are here for a reason, two people who are 
touching others in need, two people who are making a difference.

                              {time}  1030

  Meet Irma and Sasha. Stunning, aren't they? They are related. They 
look like sisters, but they are not. They are mother and daughter. The 
mom, Irma, is on the left. Her baby girl, Sasha, is on the right. Irma 
and Sasha are sisters in a cause. Both have fought breast cancer, and 
both have won.
  Each year over 200,000 American women hear four crushing words: You 
have breast cancer. Irma feared those words because she knew they may 
be coming. Both of her sisters heard those four words. One died.
  Irma beat her cancer, but lived in fear. With her family's history of 
breast cancer, her daughter had a good chance of hearing those four 
terrible words. Five years after Irma beat breast cancer, Sasha banged 
on her door, crying without end. She was 31, and she had aggressive 
breast cancer.
  Irma was by Sasha's side every second of her fight against cancer. 
Mom watched her daughter lose each breast. Mom watched her daughter go 
through 16 rounds of harsh chemotherapy. Mom watched her daughter lose 
all of her hair, her eyebrows, her eyelashes. Mom watched her daughter 
lose that smile. Sasha thought that she was no longer beautiful. Her 
will to fight was decreasing.
  Irma took charge. She told Sasha that ``no matter how sick you feel, 
get up, shower, and put some lipstick on. You are beautiful.''
  Then it hit both of them. They were women of style and grace. Cancer 
took that away. The only wigs they could find looked good on circus 
clowns. There was not a beauty shop for women with breast cancer, a 
place where they are pampered, a place where they are beautiful. They 
were going to end that.
  Dad had no choice. He gave Sasha his life savings, and in 2013 my 
wife and I walked into our friends' dream store, Cure & Co., on its 
opening day. Cure & Co. gives women with cancer real wigs, real 
facials, and real beauty products. Sasha and Irma give their clients 
hope

[[Page 16552]]

and love in the worst of times, the greatest gifts of all.
  Look one last time at Irma and Sasha. They are gorgeous, stunning, 
and beautiful. They have had breast cancer. Both of them have beaten 
breast cancer, and both of them will never leave the fight until breast 
cancer is cured forever.

                          ____________________