Momentum Women, May 2008

Honoree Fran Drescher accepts the Momentum Award™ from Ceslie Armstrong

 Since September of 2006, CESLIE- THE WOMEN'S NETWORK™ has hosted the Company's social and business networking affiliate Momentum Women™ for the members and invited guests to gather and honor a woman with the Momentum Award™ who personifies the qualities that set the standard for today's modern woman. In June of 2008, CTWN and Proskauer Rose were pleased to honor actress, author, and activist Fran Drescher with the 9th Momentum Award™.

The host committee of Julie Allen, Roberta Ashkin, Karine Bakhoum, Elise Bloom, Nina Kaminer, Lori Levine and Ceslie Armstrong all personally and professionally advocate women's health initiatives--particulary cancer. The hosts have all been affected by cancer--either directly or indirectly--as have all women across the globe and fully support the important work of the Cancer Schmancer movement and charity.

A uterine cancer survivor, but known globally as "The Nanny," Fran Drescher founded the Cancer Schmancer movement and charity named for her best selling book. "I was misdiagnosed and mistreated for a peri-menopause condition I didn't have. It took me two years and eight doctors before finally being told that I had a gynecologic cancer. I swear I got in the stirrups more times than Will Rogers!," says Drescher, "As the result of this experience, I wrote the NY times bestseller Cancer Schmancer with the hopes that in telling my story I would prevent what happened to me to happen to others. But when I went on my book tour, I realized that what happened to me had happened to millions of women like me. And so it was then I realized the book was not the end but rather the beginning of a life mission to improve women's healthcare in America."

The mission is to ensure that ALL women's cancers are diagnosed in STAGE 1, when it is most curable. Early detection equals survival. Drescher told the crowd of 125 Momentum Women and guests, "Through education, legislation, and social reform, we will not stop until the very landscape of America's women's healthcare consciousness has been replanted. We need to take control of our bodies, become greater partners with our physicians and galvanize as one to let our legislators know that the collective female vote is louder and more powerful than that of the richest corporate lobbyists. As Frederick Douglass said, 'Power concedes nothing without demand. It never has and it never will.' " said the Cancer Schmancer president and visionary.

For two hours, the members and guests of Momentum Women™ gathered at co-sponsor South Gate Restaurant in the most luxurious hotel on Central Park South in NYC: The Jumeirah Essex House.  The women tasted celebrity Chef Kerry Heffernan's specially created "cancer preventative" delectable hors d'ouevres rich in fish, vegetables, oils, and fruits while networking, sipping floral infused champagne and learning about each other's business initiatives and women's health information including the stylish and healthy products provided by goodie bag co-sponsors Gilt Groupe, Estroven, and Juvenon.  Fran Drescher addressed the guests in such a moving, beautiful, and sometimes humorous way after Ceslie Armstrong presented her with the Momentum Award™. Ceslie is a three-time cancer survivor, including the shared experience of uterine cancer, and Drescher asked Armstrong to be on the advisory board of Cancer Schmancer to support the movement and help educate women through the media that diagnosis in Stage 1 can be the cure.