SWAMPSCOTT — Anna O’Brien isn’t normally a fighter, but when the opportunity came for her to fight in honor of her late mother-in-law, she didn’t hesitate.
The Swampscott native, 31, is training with Alex Sepulveda, owner of Private Jewels Boxing Club and one of the head coaches for the New England U.S. Olympic boxing team, to fight in Haymakers for Hope’s “Belles of the Brawl.” The event is at the House of Blues in Boston on October 9.
O’Brien is fighting for her mother-in-law Josephine (Josie) Racki, who died last October, after being diagnosed with a terminal brain tumor.
“It was a very traumatic situation because she was diagnosed when I was eight months pregnant,” O’Brien said. “My husband Greg (Racki) and our daughter, Bryce, was going to be her first grandchild. After being so good with other people’s grandkids, Josie was so excited to have her own. The end of my pregnancy coincided with Josie’s treatment and her plummeting condition. She wasn’t with us mentally after that.”
Josie had a seizure in March 2018 and was diagnosed with the tumor shortly after, O’Brien said. The first week of Josie’s radiation was the week Bryce was born.
Given this was her third battle with cancer, having already beat it twice, O’Brien said she and her husband had hopes Josie would be able to fight a little longer. She held on until the baby was five months old but died on October 18 at the age of 70, seven months after her diagnosis.
“There were days that I would look at my husband unable to tell if his face was full of joy or horror,” said O’Brien. “Emotions were no longer what we were used to. His mother was dying and his daughter had just started living.”
O’Brien said she learned about Haymakers for Hope, a charitable organization that gives people the opportunity to fight back against cancer, in 2014, after she saw a close friend fight in “Belles of the Brawl.” There was always an interest in it, but there was never a reason to jump in right away, she said.
The heartbreak of her husband, who spent months splitting his time between appointments at Mass General Hospital for O’Brien and the baby and Dana-Farber Cancer Institute for his mother’s treatment, is what prompted her to apply for the match.
O’Brien will compete, along with 30 other women, in three two-minute rounds during the boxing event.
Per the requirements of the event, O’Brien had to set up a donation page and raise $7,500, but she decided to take it a step further. O’Brien swung big and made her donation goal $25,000. Whatever is raised she will donate to Dana-Farber.
Not only is she fighting for Josie’s legacy, she said she is fighting to turn all the pain from the last year into something her family can look forward to. Greg Racki, an estate-planning attorney, has committed to donating $200 to his wife’s cause for each estate plan that goes through from now until September.
With almost two months of training with Sepulveda already underway, O’Brien said the hours-long training sessions, five times a week, have become therapeutic for her. If she didn’t have a 13-month-old baby and a husband waiting for her at home, she would be in there seven days a week, she said.
“Anytime I’m having a hard time, I think of her and everything she went through,” O’Brien said. “I’m so glad to be raising this money in her honor.”
