Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...

Saturday saw residents of Suffolk and Western Tidewater come out to battle Alzheimer’s, one step and one flower at a time.

The 2024 Walk to End Alzheimer’s was held on Saturday, Sept. 14 at YMCA Camp Arrowhead to honor those lost to Alzheimer’s while raising awareness and funds for research, care and to provide support to struggling families. Attendees raised their vibrant pinwheel flowers high to share their fight, with orange flowers being those in support of the cause, purple for those who lost someone to the disease, yellow for those supporting and caring for someone living with Alzheimer’s and blue for those living with the disease. The walk continues their work until the day they add a white flower – symbolizing the first survivor of Alzheimer’s.

Alzheimer’s Association Southeastern Virginia Chapter Executive Director Katie McDonough detailed that the walk is the “world’s largest event” raising awareness and funds for those affected by Alzheimer’s and all Dementias.

“So we here in Hampton Roads have six walks. This is our first of the season here in Suffolk, and it is an opportunity for people to come out and to stand in hope with one another,” McDonough said. “We know that there are 6 million Americans living with Alzheimer’s, we know that there are 11 million people that are providing care to somebody who has Alzheimer’s. We also know that this disease kills more than prostate cancer and breast cancer combined.”

On recent advancements, McDonough noted that three treatments for Alzheimer’s are available for families as well as the ability to diagnose people earlier, calling them “tremendous progress.” 

Walk Participant Marva King shared her reasons for walking: She had an aunt who died from Alzheimer’s five years ago. King also says that her best friend is in a nursing home due to Alzheimer’s.

“And she’s just 72 years [old] like me,” King said. “So that kind of like, touched me really deeply, because I don’t think 72’s that old!”

King says that she continues to pray for her best friend and prays that scientists find a cure before her friend gets worse, whose symptoms are “aggressive.” Dr. Danielle Williams, a member of the Epsilon Theta Zeta Chapter of Zeta Phi Beta Sorority Inc., shared her reason for walking: her great-grandmother and grandmother who each suffered from Alzheimer’s with her mother suffering from Dementia.

“It’s a trend for the family,” Williams said. “So I support [the walk] so [that] my grandchildren don’t have to lose their grandmother, which is I, to what I lost my mother and my grandmother to.”

Suffolk Alpha Iota Chapter Basileus Fritz Whitfield Sr. of Omega Psi Phi Fraternity Inc. says that their organization has always been a part of being well-endowed in the community.

“And we see no other alternative but to continue to help uplift people with Alzheimer’s and it’s a byway as a means of us knowing that it’s involving families and we’re about family,” Whitfield said. “And with families, oftentimes the burden is not just on the person that has Alzheimer’s, but it’s also the families that does the suffering as well. And so we’re here to uplift them and give them a little bit of rest as well as continue to push them forward and encourage them that there [are] great signs of a cure for Alzheimer’s and we look forward to being a part of that…”

Williams hopes attendees will understand that it is a group effort to beat Alzheimer’s.

“…it takes all of us to join together to fight the disease, and bring it to an end,” Williams said.