LAUREL-LEA JENNINGS
Nominee for what Award/s
Everyday Legend Award (People's Choice)
Amplifier of Good Award
Everyday Legend Award (People's Choice)
Everyday Legend Award (People's Choice)
What small daily actions have defined who you are?
I had to really think about this question. It’s not something that comes naturally to me, asking myself questions like this, but if I had to answer it truthfully…. oh gosh I don’t know! I guess a small action that I do on a daily basis is check in with my friends. Life if hard, shit things happen, and I just like them to know that I am still here. I live about a 3-hour drive from most of my friends so it’s really important to me that I let them know that I am still here. Just a simple “how was your day” message at the end of most days is something I am known for. I spent many years with no one to talk to about things. Days can get long and dark if you don’t have an outlet. In most circles I am known as the mum of the group because I am always looking out for everyone else’s wellbeing, no matter what is going on with me. The other daily action I do is post to my National Breast Cancer Fundraiser page. I try to post a fact about Breast Cancer, or something to do with my current fundraiser, any now research information that has been released or just a simple check in with people who follow my page.
How do you support others without seeking recognition?
I love to see people succeed in life. I want everyone to do well with whatever they want to do, and I try and support them wherever I can. Weather it be via an affirmation, a reference, just being a sound board for them to share what they are going through, drive them to appointments or interviews, take care of their kids while they do something or simply just need an hour to themselves. I try to be as helpful as I can. For so many years, all these wonderful, amazing people supported me through my darkest times and through some of the most heart-breaking stages of my life, being able to give back is the least I can do, and I don’t need recognition from them. I am here to take the load off them. I also am part of the NBCF community fundraising team and have been for 16 years. I help support other people with their fundraisers and help guide them in the right direction. I try and do this faceless on social media. We are all here for the same cause and I want to help them succeed in all the things they do. Reading about their results and how they went after the fact is rewarding enough and to know that you helped them be great means the world to me.
Tell us about a moment when your quiet leadership made a big difference?
While living in Atherton, QLD, I started a fundraiser Bingo for Breast Cancer. I did this for 3 years and then we got word that we were moving. I wanted to keep the event alive in the community and I found someone who was as passionate as I was about the cause and mentored them to take over the event for 2024. I worked in the background and just let her work her magic and I just steered her into the right direction and tried to give her the acknowledgment that she deserved. She struggled a little with me not being there, but we worked through it, and we had a very successful event. I kept my name off everything, but the initial fundraising paperwork, but she did it all. Initially it was a little difficult for me to let go of the reins like I did, because it was my baby and raising this event up from the ground is something I am very proud of, but once I learnt to let go and trust and I worked with her, we got through it. I grew as a mentor and also as a squad leader for my own team here in Brisbane. Cara has now gone on to create her own masterpiece in Atheron and I wish her all the very best success. The other big difference it has made is on my own fundraising team here in Brisbane. Last year I had to start fresh with a new team and I didn’t know how we were all going to go. Most had never been involved with a fundraiser like ours, so it was a little overwhelming but last year we had the best event we have done to date and raised $12,081 for the NBCF. My team are now pros and I don’t even have to say anything and they are all excited, have ideas, they reach out and ask questions and I could not be prouder of them. If I was to leave tomorrow, they would be able to run their own successful events without me at the helm.
What fuels your consistent care for others?
I am the oldest of 4 siblings, so I think caring for others is just in my nature. I like to take care of people and to make sure they are looked after. Growing up, and I mean no disrespect to my parents, I didn’t have a very loving upbringing. My parents loved me, but there was no affection, no one checked on us to make sure we were ok or coping with school and life. It was us looking after ourselves. So, I did it. I made sure my siblings were looked after, and I made sure we all had those conversations about difficult times. Even know, I check in with my siblings almost every day. I need to know that people are ok. I always wished I had someone check in on me so I promised myself that I would always be that person for someone else. Even now as an almost 43-year-old, I need to make sure that everyone is being looked after. I feel sorry for my daughter, who is only 2, because she will always have be around to make sure she is ok. The other thing that fuels my constant care for others is I think the yearning to be a mum for such a long time. My husband and I spent 17 years trying for a family cos all I wanted in life was to be a mum. A fertility clinic, surrogate, my sisters’ eggs, my husband’s sperm, and a lifetime later, I got to be a mum. My best friends would probably tell you that becoming a mum made me worse and now I “mum” them ha-ha.
What does being an “Everyday Legend” mean to you?
An Everyday Legend, to me, means someone who is consistent every day. Someone who does things day in and day out and takes time out of their own lives, no matter what id going on, to be there for someone else. Being an Everyday Legend myself, would mean the world to me. I never toot my own horn or like to take recognition for anything I ever do, but this would mean that I am actually doing something right. That what I am doing has made a difference in someone’s life. To even be nominated for this award has blown my mind. When I got the message that I was nominated, I sat and stared at my screen for about 15 minutes. Firstly, I appreciated the nomination and the actual enormity of the award, and then secondly, I went into detective mode to try and work out who nominated me and actually understand why. The reason that Katrina gave me when she said it was her that nominated me made me cry. I didn’t realise just how much I have impacted her life over the last 30 years we have known each other. My one simple message to her at the end of her day checking in makes all the difference. I never realised she felt like that, she has never said anything to me, and to tell me through an award nomination is pure craziness. I have never being nominated for anything before in my life and have never won anything so just being nominated has ticked a box off my bucket list.
Amplifier of Good Award
Amplifier of Good Award
What cause or mission lights you up the most?
The cause that is the light of my life is Breast Cancer Awareness. Everyone has that notion that ‘it won’t affect me’, and I won’t lie, I did too. Growing up as a women you are always taught to check your breasts often, you read about famous people passing due to Breast Cancer and hear of friends’ family members having this disease. I never thought cancer would rock our world like it did. In 2006 my grandmother was diagnosed with Breast Cancer and that is where my journey to help make a difference began. Like a snowball rolling down the alps, my passion, knowledge and fundraising has just gotten bigger and better. I have been part of the National Breast Cancer Foundations Community Fundraising Team for more than 16 years now. I put together events to help bring awareness to Breast Cancer, to educate and to raise the much-needed funds that the NBCF needs to fund research grant around the country. Some people may feel that there is so many fundraisers for Breast Cancer out there, and that doesn’t bother me at all. The more awareness that is out there, the better people are educated about this disease, and they get themselves checked on a regular basis and hopefully be able to catch the cancer early enough that they can have a full recovery. Over the last 16 years, with the help from the people who support me, I have been able to donate over $80,000 to the NBCF. It makes me so proud to be a part of something so amazing, and it also helps that Pink is my favourite colour!
How have you used your platform or business to create positive change?
Being able to hold fundraisers every year has been amazing. Using this platform to bring Breast Awareness out to the public and to also educate people about Breast Cancer facts, that maybe that they had no idea about, is extremely rewarding. During out events we pay respect to those we have lost to Breast Cancer, we celebrate those who fought and won their battle, and we also send prayers out for those who are going through treatment. Each table at out events has a name dedication on them. This helps people at our event personalise why they are all there to start with. Yes, bingo is fun and having a raffle is great cos they can win some prizes, but actually being about to put peoples’ names, and faces if they are at the event, to the cause and what we are fighting for to start with. Then community loves that we honour those around us and that they are the ones who name their tables. We add flyers to the tables and even though we want them to have fun, we also want them to leave and go get that mammogram that they have been putting off, we want them to go get a lump checked that they thought was nothing because they are a male. We try and make those tiny positive changes to help make a huge impact for the future of our community.
Tell us about a moment you saw your "good work" ripple outward.
The moment I knew I was doing something amazing was on 2 occasions. Firstly, at one of our events, I had a woman come up to me and thank me for urging everyone who was eligible to get a mammogram. She received her results, and she had to have a biopsy done, and she had the lump removed due to having cancer markers. Because it was so early, she didn’t need any follow up treatment but if she had left it any longer then it would have turned into something more aggressive. To hear that someone who was at one of our events was listening to what we were saying and walked away, made an appointment, and it saved her life, made my world turn upside down and my heart full of gratitude. I do what I do to make a difference and to raise awareness about Breast Cancer, and one little talk, changed this woman’s life forever. Second one was when I received a call from the National Breast Cancer Foundation and I was asked if I wanted to attend, as a special guest, a luncheon at the University of Queensland Cancer Laboratories, where the NBCF have funded some research grants. Absolutely honoured and floored was my response. Due to the work I have done for the NBCF over the last 16 years, I was one of a very limited amount of people in QLD that was able to tour the lab, ask questions, see where the money goes and be a part of the next chapter of the research grants. Being able to see, hear and speak to research professors, staff from the NBCF and gather knowledge to pass on to people at future events was a very big highlight to my time as a community fundraiser.
What obstacles did you face while amplifying others?
I guess one of the biggest obstacles and challengers I have faced over the last 16 years is that there are so many charities out there for Breast Cancer. Everywhere you look, someone is raising funds and awareness for Breast Cancer, but for a multitude of different cancer charities. I had to find a way to make MY charity, MY fundraiser stand out from the crowd. The NBCF is not a government funded charity, it purely relies on fundraisers and charities to raise the money for them to fund the research projects. This is what made me interested in them to start with. I wanted to make a difference for the future, for the big picture, and not the now. This is what I started promoting during the lead up to events and also during the events. Sharing these insights made people more aware of what and why I was doing what I was doing. Like minded people were becoming interested and wanting to make a difference that way. Separating the NBCF from the other cancer charities out there was how we were going to make a biggest impact. We often will get the usual “sorry, I already donated to Breast Cancer this year” but when you explain the difference, you don’t have that obstacle anymore.
What’s your bigger vision for making an even greater impact?
My vision is a very simple one – Zero deaths from Breast Cancer. I know this is probably never going to happen, not in my lifetime, but if I can do my small part in making research possible for my daughter’s lifetime, then I have done good. I have so many dreams and goals I would love to reach for the NBCF. Bigger and better fundraising events, a pink gala dinner, merchandise range, school education on breast awareness – because Breast Cancer does not take your age, sex or race into consideration, and I could go on and on about the things that I have spoken about with my team. Every cancer matters, and I am not discounting them, but this cancer is an evil entity, and we need to band together to help each and every person who has breast tissue know about the risks and dangers of not getting things checked. I have spoken to local council representatives in the town we live in about getting more education in schools about breast care. They just keep telling me that it’s a school board thing not a council thing. I would love the age to be dropped for the free mammograms. 40 is too high considering the number of women under 40 who have been diagnosed. I am grateful for the life I have and that I have the time and tools to do what I do but I always feel like there should be more I am doing. I guess we all feel like that.