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PrintAmbassadors of Goodwill
Stephanie Siegel recalls the words as if they had been spoken yesterday and not in November 2007. Her husband, Ned, had just been sworn in as the 12th United States ambassador to the Bahamas when then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice turned to the Boca Raton residents.
“She looked at us both and said, ‘The president absolutely knew what he was doing when he chose you,’” Stephanie says. “The Bahamas hadn’t had a husband-wife team in a long time that showed any kind of presence. This wasn’t just about one [ambassador]; it was about the two of us as a couple.”
The Siegels found strength not only in that number but also in the 300,000-plus residents of the Bahamas—strength on which they would come to rely as Stephanie battled breast cancer. During Ned’s 14-month tenure as ambassador, Stephanie underwent lumpectomies to remove three cancerous cysts on her left breast and, later, upon learning she had cancer in the right breast, a double mastectomy.
Instead of keeping the matter private, the Siegels went public in an effort to help a population all too familiar with such a story. Nearly 50 percent of Bahamian women under 50 are diagnosed with breast cancer. In August 2008, the Siegels launched the Bahamas Breast Cancer Initiative, a public-private partnership dedicated to raising awareness, and improving detection and treatment of the disease.
“Stephanie’s strength and courage was not only inspiring to me and the embassy, but to the cause in which we were involved,” says Ned, owner of a real estate investment and development group bearing his name. “She was living it as she was preaching it.”
“We came home every night to letters, cards, flowers and phone calls,” says Stephanie, who is cancer-free. “[The Bahamian people] gave so much to us; they allowed us to heal. It was only natural to want to give back.”
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