2026 ILT Mom Honoree
Lori Mann
Hi! I am Lori Mann. I’m a devoted wife to the love of my life, Kristin and Mama to our four amazing young children. At 12 years old, I fell in love with American Sign Language (ASL) and knew then that I wanted a career as an interpreter. Twenty-six years later, I still love what I do every day.
In 2009, I graduated summa cum laude, earning my Master's in Writing with a focus on creative non-fiction. In 2010, I published a book, My Stagedoor Family and copies have since sold all over the world. Oh, and I had cancer, too.
When I was diagnosed with breast cancer in October 2023, it felt like everything in my life instantly collapsed. My absolute worst fears suddenly became my reality. I feared that I was going to die and suddenly I would just drop out of family photos. I thought about the fact that my children’s childhood stories would now include this nightmare. I thought about how Kristin would have to go on without me, raising our four precious children on her own.
The fear, the guilt, and the grief were invasive. They took unwelcome shelter inside my chest and there wasn’t any room for air. It was the shock of a treatment plan that felt unbearable before it even began, and the sudden realization that the future Kristin and I had imagined no longer was.
Also during this time, there was a quiet, invisible grief for what my loved ones would have to experience. Cancer doesn’t just affect the person with the diagnosis; it affects the whole family. I thought about my parents when I had to tell them that their daughter had cancer. Telling my brother that his little sis was going to be sick for a while. Telling our children. The weight that my wife had to bear working full time, managing our home and children, and now caring for me physically and emotionally. It felt a tornado of fear, guilt, grief, panic, anger, and exhaustion colliding all at once. Then suddenly there was Spring Williams of Inspiring Life Together (ILT).
A friend of mine mentioned Inspiring Life Together to me for the second time after I’d already heard of it through my oncologist, the life-saving Dr. Grana. I decided to reach out and they ended up taking me on as their December 2023 Mom and, just like that, changed our lives forever.
Inspiring Life Together changed the way I understand support. They didn’t make me feel like a recipient of charity; they made me feel like I belonged. They gave generously in tangible ways—mastectomy pillows for post-op healing, satin pillowcases for when my hair started falling out and again when it started growing back. They sent burn cream for when radiation made it so painful you had anxiety over simply breathing. They arranged oncology-safe massages. They sent professional cleaning services to our home, multiple times. They offered free classes at local businesses that support health and wellness—boxing, yoga, fitness classes, float therapy—reminding us that our bodies were still worthy of care, movement, and strength.
They sent our children to the summer camps of their dreams. They gave us museum memberships and family experiences so we could create memories when joy felt out of reach.
They create spaces specifically for our children where they weren’t “the children of someone with cancer”; they were just kids—laughing, swimming, being carefree and present.
These are the moments designed not as distractions from cancer, but as acknowledgments of how deeply cancer affects the kids, too.
ILT understands that healing is not only physical. They supported us emotionally through connection and consistency. ILT is a steady reminder that we are not alone in this. Inspiring Life Together reminded me that I was still whole, even in the midst of everything cancer was trying to take.
At the very beginning of my diagnosis, one of my doctors said something to me that carried me through every stage of treatment (and still does). It became my mantra—something I returned to again and again when things felt impossible.
It was simply, “You are strong, and you can do hard things.”
I didn’t always believe it, but I held onto it anyway. I pulled it out on the days when fear was louder than hope, when I wasn’t sure my family could survive this without being blown apart. I reminded myself that I could do this. That we could do this. Inspiring Life Together embodies that truth. So, while they can’t take the cancer away— they help make the unbearable survivable. They remind families that strength doesn't mean doing it alone. Sometimes, strength looks like being held.
In the end, life is just a collection of stories—it’s the stories we tell ourselves, the stories people tell of us, and stories we tell of others. It is in that spirit that I write:
To anyone walking through cancer, or any kind of trauma, and to the families walking beside them: You are strong and you can do hard things.
