BEAUMONT, Texas — “I got a call from my dad in the Tuesday and he was just like you need to come home your mom went into the hospice,” said Lamar soccer player Hollie Massey.
Hollie Massey is captain of Lamar's soccer team and in November of last year she experienced the ultimate loss. She lost her mother to cancer.
“Mum got diagnosed with cancer like my sophomore year and in September, October, there started to be a decrease in how she was,” said Massey.
Massey flew back to England while her mother was in the hospice for what would be the last moments she had with her mom.
“I arrived in England, I just got home, got showered, and went straight to the hospice," said Massey. "Mom was kind of a little bit conscious, not really. She knew who I was but she was confused what was happening."
"Seeing her struggle and seeing her in pain helped me let go and that’s where the Hospice was absolutely brilliant.”
Massey said since the moment her mom died, she felt the urge to give back to the hospice so she started a fundraiser with some help from her teammate Vivienne Carr.
“I was like well I can’t bake so I can’t do a bake sale, stuff like that, so I was like I can run. I’m an athlete so let’s do something that’s running," said Massey. "We decided to do a marathon."
" Vivienne’s from Washington and I saw one after we break off of school in Washington so I text Viv initially going ‘What about the marathon on the 15th of May? Could I come to Washington?’ And she texted me back ‘Yes, definitely.’ Her locker is over there so I went up to her at practice and was like ‘You’re serious about the marathon?’ and she’s like ‘Yeah, I’ll run it too.’"
Now the two are training together, motivating each other with a greater purpose in mind.
“To see the grace and the strength that she had going through that and I think that stuck out to me, and not only just for me, set an example for the team because our captain is going through this while still being a leader and still getting to play a full 90 minutes," said teammate Vivienne Carr.
"I mean that’s a pretty impressive person so why wouldn’t you want to help her out when you can,” said Carr.
Massey and Carr plan to run the Capital City Marathon in Olympia, Washington on May 15 for the East Cheshire Hospice in Macclesfield, England.
Massey said the East Cheshire Hospice only receives 17 percent of their funding from the government so it heavily rely on donations.
If you would like to contribute to Massey's cause, the link below leads you to her fundraising page.
https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/hollie-massey