From left, Crystal Wonderling, Dixie Perrine and Val Andreassi are nurses at Butler Memorial Hospital and close friends. As “Team Hope” they are trying to raise $10,000 to benefit the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention as “Team Hope,” in memory of Wonderling's daughter.

Crystal Wonderling is moving forward — with her feet and with her friends.

The combination of both may help others dealing with situations like hers to move forward as well.

Wonderling lost her only child — a daughter named Hope, a Butler High School senior — to suicide in 2014. An all-star softball player with the Golden Tornado, Hope was due to graduate in less than three weeks and was going to continue her academic and softball career at Butler County Community College.

“I had no idea anything was bothering her,” Wonderling said of her daughter. “I didn't notice any signs ... nothing.”

Crystal Wonderling ran track and field at Slippery Rock High School. She graduated in 1996 and didn't run for three years before picking it up again.

Now she has an additional reason to pound the pavement.

“It helps me mentally to get through what I need to get through,” Wonderling said.

She has run a couple of marathons — the Buffalo Marathon in 2018 and the Pittsburgh Marathon last year. She ran the Pittsburgh Marathon in 4 hours, 26.30 minutes, finishing among the top third of the female 40-49 age group.

When she ran the Pittsburgh event, she wore Hope's name on her bib.

And people responded.

“I heard people shouting out her name as I ran by,” Wonderling said of the marathon. “That meant a lot. It made me want to do more.”

Enter Valorie Andreassi and Dixie Perrine. Like Wonderling, they are nurses at Butler Memorial Hospital. The three are co-workers, close friends and fitness buddies.

Andreassi and Perrine have never run a full marathon. Andreassi has run three half-marathons while Perrine has run one. They decided to do the May 3 Pittsburgh Marathon with Wonderling.

While the marathon has been canceled because of the coronavirus pandemic, Pittsburgh Marathon officials are offering all runners a “virtual option” in which they can run a marathon on their own, record and submit their times.

The marathon runs do not have to be on May 3 or on a course in Pittsburgh.

“We wanted to support Crystal,” Andreassi said. “This is also a way to bring awareness and donations to the suicide issue. We want to make the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention a marathon charity.”

Donations in the name of Team Hope may be made at http://afsp.donordrive.com/team/248263.

Donations through Team Hope individuals may be made for Andreassi at http://afsp.donordrive.com/participant/2274719. The number for Wonderling is 2283686 and for Perrine 2274720.

All donations are 100 percent tax deductible.

This is an excerpt from a larger article that appeared in Sunday's Butler Eagle. Subscribe online or in print to read the full article.