September 13th has been selected by Congress as National Childhood Cancer Awareness Day, which is fitting because as some of you know September is the awareness month for childhood cancer.
I haven’t been updating as much lately because, well, things have been wonderful. We are blessedly preoccupied with normal things and enjoying every minute of the mundane.
To be frank however, we wouldn’t be enjoying any of this if it wasn’t for research and awareness. With every person that comes to understand the plight of a child with cancer comes the willingness to make their lives better- or to ensure that they have a life to enjoy in the first place.
In 1964, the survival rate for a child with Leukemia was a shocking 4%. If Kaitlyn had had the misfortune to get cancer just 40 years ago I would be writing about the giant hole she left in our family. Hard to read, but true. A few doctors got together back then and decided to try something called chemotherapy; and then to collaborate with other doctors so that they could better understand the effect of these new medicines.
Thus started the most successful medical breakthrough in history. Children started to live beyond a few months- doctors who treated adult cancers began to use chemotherapy in their patients and began to use the same research model as the pediatric doctors which gave rise to similar success.
It all started with research for children.
50 years later, we are still using many of the same drugs and some claim we have reached the peak of their effectiveness. In other words, we need to continue to find new drugs and therapies that will cure the remaining 20% of children that die from cancer. We need to find more selective treatments that do not leave children’s bodies battered and families scarred and financially devastated.
Finding new treatments takes money- let’s be honest about that. It takes money to fund doctors and drugs and test tubes.
But before we ask people to just fork over the dough, we need to first give them a gut feeling reason to. I’m not talking about praying on the sympathies of good people so that they open their wallets. I’m talking about rationally explaining the genuine need to complete the mission.
Despite the success of cancer research, I have the true life experience to say that we need to do more.
Not many children are forced to rationalize the pain of treatment against death. But that is what she did for over two years. Even after the steroids shredded her bones, she kept taking them- knowing it could cause more damage. And she knew why- because without them she could die. She kept taking vincristine even though it deadened her nerves which caused her stomach agony. Because without that medicine, she wouldn’t be here. She took doxyrubicin that made her bald- when her hair fell out she tried to grab it and hold it onto her head in a desperate attempt to keep it. But she kept taking that medicine because she knew that’s what it took to beat her leukemia.
These drugs are a miracle because they gave us hope.
But why stop at hope? Let’s resolve to fund new medicines that can effect a cure. Let’s commit to better treatments that won’t ravage her body and spirit.
THAT is the frontline of cancer today.
So, while this is not a plea for your money- although if you want to donate to research you can at www.curesearch.org - it is a plea for you to spread awareness of childhood cancer. With awareness comes willingness.
Tell your family and friends that there is not a cure yet for childhood cancer; that the medicines help but are also brutal on their developing bodies.
Wear an awareness pin so that strangers might ask you what it is for.
Forward this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AGS4yE5v9rM
to everyone in your address book.
Together we can transform hope into the cure.
Thank you so much for checking in.
Betsy
