The First Delivery: Returning to Oncology With Something to Give.
Mission in Action · September 2026
The First Delivery
Some days the mission comes back and touches the place where it began.
The first wellness backpacks were delivered to the oncology center at the Jamaica Plain VA campus.
The backpacks were created to bring practical comfort, useful resources, and a reminder that someone is thinking about the person in the chair.
A return to an oncology floor, this time carrying something in rather than waiting for medicine to be put into me.
Mission Becoming Tangible
Today was the first delivery.
Earlier this year, the Mabazza Foundation received a $10,000 grant to create wellness backpacks for veterans navigating cancer.
We spent months selecting the contents, assembling the packs, preparing our Veterans Cancer Support Guide, and thinking carefully about what might bring a little comfort during an extraordinarily difficult time.
Today, I loaded the first delivery into my car and brought it to the VA hospital in Jamaica Plain.
Everything felt ordinary at first.
Boxes. Bags. A cart. An elevator. Introductions.
Then we reached the oncology center.
And suddenly, it wasn’t ordinary anymore.
A Room I Knew Too Well
Standing there brought me immediately back to my own cancer treatment.
I remembered FOLFIRINOX chemotherapy.
I remembered sitting in the chair as the treatment became progressively harder with each cycle. I remembered the strange taste in my mouth, the uncontrollable blinking, the shaking, the tears, and asking the nurses to please disconnect me because I didn’t think I could tolerate another minute.
And I remembered them telling me, gently but firmly, that we needed to keep going.
Today, standing in another oncology center years later, those memories came back with a force I wasn’t expecting.
I started crying.
Not a ceremonial tear. Not the kind you quickly wipe away and continue talking.
I simply could not stop.
Afterward, I walked outside and sat on a bench in front of the hospital because, for a while, I couldn’t make myself walk back to the car.
The Difference This Time
But this time, I wasn’t there for treatment.
That realization eventually found its way through all the emotion.
“ I had returned to an oncology floor carrying something in, rather than waiting for medicine to be put into me.
What We Carried In
Small things cannot make chemotherapy easy. They can still matter.
Inside each backpack was a soft blanket, cozy socks, a 32-ounce insulated bottle, Liquid I.V., lotion, Burt’s Bees lip balm, hand sanitizer, an adult coloring book and crayons, and a resource guide created specifically to help veterans with cancer find support in the community.
None of those things can make chemotherapy easy.
Comfort matters.
A warm blanket, soft socks, or something useful to drink from can become surprisingly meaningful during a long day of treatment.
Being remembered matters.
The backpack says something before a single item is used: someone thought about the person who would eventually receive it.
Being understood matters.
Sometimes, when you are sitting in that chair, knowing that somebody who understands thought about you matters more than anyone outside that room might imagine.
What Survivorship Can Become
Sometimes survivorship means walking back into the difficult rooms carrying something for the person sitting there now.
Today reminded me that survivorship is not always about leaving the difficult rooms behind.
Sometimes it means finding the strength to walk back into them.
Not because the memory has disappeared.
Not because the room no longer hurts.
But because the person you were in that chair can become part of what you offer the person sitting there now.
Private survival becoming public service.
The First Backpacks Have Been Delivered
It was one of the hardest days I’ve experienced in a long time.
For a while, I could not make myself leave the bench outside the hospital.
But eventually another truth settled beside the memories.
I had come back.
I had walked into an oncology center again.
And this time I was carrying something for somebody else.
It was a very good day.
With gratitude,
Uchenna Obinabo-Mabazza
Founder, Mabazza Foundation
Survivorship · Service · Community
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