On Thursday evening at the Superior Community Center, several volunteers and community members gather around the tables, cutting, sewing and creating labels for heart-shaped pillows.
It’s a pillow-making party and fundraiser for the local nonprofit JWill Pink Village Inc.
A few years back, founder of the organization Jen Willard would have never thought she’d be here.
When Willard, a Superior resident, was first diagnosed with breast cancer in December 2015, she began to think the worst. It was Christmas Eve when she received the phone call from her nurse and all she could think after was, ‘Will this be my last Christmas?’
“It takes your breath away,” Willard said. “There were more questions than there were answers.
“My boys at the time were in sixth and eighth grade and I was newly remarried, so immediately I started thinking, ‘Will I get to see my boys graduate high school? Will I get to grow old with my husband?’”
Going through a double mastectomy a few months later, Willard received a heart-shaped pillow from the hospital that she calls “a godsend.”
Willard is now living cancer-free and has spent the past few years working to help others diagnosed with breast cancer through her pillow-making organization.
“This pillow — it looks like just a pillow but it represents life,” Willard said. “This pillow was my life. It looks so simple but I can tell you there were days when I sat in my chair, discouraged, disappointed, at a loss and I would think about who made this.
“It sounds crazy but it gave me hope. People that I never even met and probably will never meet are rooting for me. It became a security blanket.”
JWill Pink Village Inc., is in its fourth year since its founding and has seen significant growth over the years, including a patent on the pillow design and the organization’s logo and name being trademarked.
Starting with about 40 volunteers, the organization now has a few thousand people involved, Willard said. Volunteers range from many different ages, but each will either trace, cut, sew, stuff, tag the pillows, pick up supplies, make cards or deliver them to hospitals.
Breast cancer survivors will also write handwritten tags with the phrase: “This pillow was made by volunteers with love and hope. Sending you strength and courage. You are not alone! Xoxo.”
“I am the owner of two pillows and I will say they were wonderful,” said volunteer Tammy Morgan. “I just quit using it and I’ve been out of surgery since February.
“You have your port and then you have your mastectomy, so you have all these scars and surgeries and these nerves have been cut so it hurts. So to not have that seatbelt right on that makes a huge difference as far as how you feel in the car and how safe you feel driving. It’s very sweet to know other people are thinking about you.”
One of the younger volunteers, 9-year-old Greta Senecal, said she enjoys stuffing pillows during the nonprofit’s pillow-making parties both because it helps someone and it’s also stress-relieving.
She attended the pillow-making party to continue helping out.
“It’s a good cause but it’s also good to get into if you’re in a bad mood,” Senecal said Thursday evening. “It’s a good place to get into a better headspace. I remember for my first pillow party I got so mad when it was time to go to bed because it was at my house and I wanted to stuff more.”
Willard said that the nonprofit has donated more than 4,000 pillows to date and has delivered to every hospital in the northern Colorado area that does mastectomies. The pillows are also donated out of state, and the organization has partnered with five new hospitals since 2019.
Willard said when they give to a hospital, she asks how many mastectomies they perform in a year and she will double the amount in pillows so they have more than enough.
Looking forward, Willard said she hopes to reach even more people by taking a road trip across the country, delivering pillows.
“I just want them to know that they’re not alone. I want them to know that I was in their shoes, or similar shoes, and this pillow is not only made with a purpose, it’s hope and kindness,” Willard said.
“I may have started this, but it never would be what it is today if it wasn’t for the kindness and goodness of other people stepping forward.”
Visit facebook.com/JWILLpink/ to learn more about the nonprofit.
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