Bismarck hosts the 16th annual Brave the Shave Main Event

Bismarck, North Dakota – Almost 100 local families affected by childhood cancer were honored and supported by the community, which gathered once more.

In order to assist families like the Ungerers, whose four-year-old daughter Thea has been battling cancer, Brave the Shave was founded in 2008.

“A Wilms tumor is a kidney cancer. They ended up having to remove her entire right kidney. She went through 22 weeks of chemotherapy, next week we hit nine months post-chemo,” said Kendra Ungerer, mom to Thea.

Almost 100 local families affected by childhood cancer were honored and supported by the community, which gathered once more.

In order to assist families like the Ungerers, whose four-year-old daughter Thea has been battling cancer, Brave the Shave was founded in 2008.

“The parent can be by the child’s side during treatment is crucial. Many parents will either lose their job or possibly go bankrupt trying to pay the bills. If Brave the Shave can come in help out and step in and be able to support them, awesome,” said LaShae Graf, executive director of Brave the Shave.

To fight children’s cancer, teams and individuals who have donated money participate in shaving their heads. The Ungerer family is pleased to see individuals working together in this way.

“Families like us that are in, honestly, the worst possible nightmare that a parent can ever imagine. To see such amazing people come to want to support you and help you through that has been one of the most humbling experiences that we have gone through,” said Ungerer.

The Brave the Shave Foundation believes that people will remember this from the event even though the head shaving and fundraising are crucial.

“Awareness. Childhood cancer is not rare. People like to think it is rare, but it’s not. It’s one of those things that you kind of avoid until it happens to you and for many of these families, they were not a family with childhood cancer until that day they woke up and have that doctor say, ‘Your child has cancer,’” said Graf.

The event raised more than $100,000 this year.

It was this year’s 16th occurrence. You can visit their website and select “donate” if you want to support this cause.