Our Mission
The Michael L. DiTore Small Moments Foundation was founded in 2023 by Rebecca DiTore after her husband and the father of her two young boys lost his life to brain cancer at the age of 30.
Our Mission
Our mission is to create small moments of joy by gifting personalized local experiences to children who’ve lost a parent or sibling to cancer.
Through these small moments of joy, we aim to support the mental health of grieving children.
Background
In April of 2021, my husband, Michael, started experiencing weakness in his left hand during his morning workouts. At the time, our boys were 2 years old and 6 months old.
What was thought to be a case of Carpel Tunnel, turned into a diagnosis of terminal brain cancer. Mike lived 17 months with this horrible disease. My children and I witnessed first hand some of the very ugliest sides of cancer.
Throughout this journey, it has been, and still is, the small moments of joy that help my boys and I continue to move forward. The generous experiences people gifted us after losing Mike helped force us out of the house and away from our reality at home. They allowed us to find reasons to smile and helped us create happy memories together in our new family dynamic.
Though our home life felt anything but normal, I felt passionate that my children still needed to experience “normal” kid-life while they grieved. The local experiences gifted to us gave us a sense of renewal during our early grieving period.
In fact, I found these small moments absolutely critical for our mental health.