Two months after the operation, the overnight chemotherapy treatments started.
For six weeks, Lisa Manns would travel from her home in Seymour to the University of Louisville James Graham Brown Cancer Center.
While the treatments tested Manns physically and mentally, she never felt alone through her battle against ovarian cancer.
Even when Manns trekked through the darkest valleys, her friends, Mandy Craze, Mary Cunningham and Joan Logan, were going to make sure she didn’t venture alone.
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Each time Manns returned home from her appointments in Kentucky on Thursdays, a care package awaited her arrival.
On all six occasions, Manns had letters of encouragement and gifts from her support system — and also some from complete strangers — on her doorstep.
She credits those acts of kindness for helping her during her battle, and now, she’s giving back to cancer patients all across the country.
Now cancer-free, Manns and her team are helping others fighting cancer with an organization called Warrior Bags.
The unincorporated nonprofit organization, which was acknowledged as a 501(c)(3) in August 2018, sends bags filled with items to “warriors” across the country.
The bags typically include a large blanket, a letter of encouragement, chemo bands, hand sanitizer, lip balm, tummy drops (for nausea) and bath bombs. The bags also include seasonal items like winter hats and scarves.
Manns said all of the items are either donated or purchased with donated money, and the nonprofit typically doesn’t have any personal connection to the individuals receiving the bags.
“We’ve had a lot of donations and gracious people,” she said. “People just love to walk alongside people with cancer. It seems like everyone knows somebody with cancer. If they don’t, they know somebody who knows somebody. It is, unfortunately, everywhere.”
As of Oct. 24, 121 bags have reached women and men across the country across 18 different states. One bag also was sent to a person in Paris, France, Manns said.
Manns moved to the area in 2016 after her husband, Kirk, accepted his current position as athletic director at Seymour High School.
About a year removed from moving to Indiana, in June 2017, they went to Michigan for a family celebration.
It was during that trip that Lisa received a call that she had cancer, and her life changed in an instant.
Soon after receiving the news, Kirk called a relative who works in the medical field that lives in Sellersburg and asked where they needed to go to get help.
Manns then began her battle against cancer.
Once the treatments ended, she tried to think of ways to help others.
“When I was done, on the other side of chemo and was getting my hair back and feeling stronger, I thought I wanted to do that same thing,” Manns said. “They blessed me. Yes, I had dark and hopeless days, but in those moments, there was a small glimmer of light that was like God saying, ‘I haven’t forgotten you. I’m going to walk this out with you.’ I wanted to do that same thing.”
During a trip to Chicago to catch a Cubs game, Craze and Manns came up with the idea for Warrior Bags.
The nonprofit took off from there, and interest has picked up through word of mouth and social media.
Lisa Awwiller of Fredericktown, Ohio, was one of the first to receive a bag.
“I had put out on Facebook that I was going to the OSU James Cancer Center for some testing, and one of their members reached out and contacted me and said they had a Warrior Bag for me,” Awwiller said.
“I didn’t know it existed, and I guess I was the first one to receive one,” she said. “One of the members came to me and brought me a beautiful leather bag. It had a beautiful blanket, some chapstick, a notebook and bracelet with Scripture on it and all kinds of different things. I take the blanket with me to every appointment. If I have a CAT scan or anything like that, they let me use my blanket.”
She said it meant a lot to receive the bag, and she has recommended the organization to others.
“You don’t want to go through this by yourself,” Awwiller said. “It’s nice to know other people out there are thinking about you. They’re strangers. I was really taken aback when they called me and said they wanted me to do this. There’s a girl at our church that has two little kids that just found out that she has breast cancer. The first thing I did was send a note to Warrior Bags saying I knew a girl that could use one. I am always keeping my ears open.”
Jen Milne of Rochester, Pennsylvania, received a bag shortly after getting diagnosed with ovarian cancer in June 2018.
“You sometimes feel like you’re on an island of your own (with cancer),” Milne said. “Lisa’s experiences with what she went through were so similar to mine. Just to know that someone cared enough to do something like that meant a lot. The items they sent were really relevant to what you need while going through chemo. There was a lot of thought into it.”
Milne said she has requested bags on two different occasions for other cancer patients.
In the future, Manns would like to see the nonprofit reach an even larger scale.
“I have a lot of ideas. I would love for this to just become a national thing,” she said. “I would like a bag that is recognizable wherever they go. I want everyone to be able to get one of these bags and to be blessed in their dark time. Down the road, I would love to have a retreat for these warriors where they come in and we just pamper the snot out of them, just make them feel so special and celebrate their victory.”
Manns said she also has had requests for bags for children and would like to make those in the future.
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Warrior Bags is an unincorporated nonprofit that was acknowledged as a 501(c)(3) in August 2018.
The organization sends bags filled with gifts to cancer patients across the country.
Seymour resident Lisa Manns is the president and chairwoman of the board of Warrior Bags.
To request a bag be sent to an individual, make a donation or request information, visit warriorbags.org.
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