September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month

[Oompaloompa197878]

Hi all! Long time lurker in the SF community. I'm known as "K" on my YouTube channel (if anyone goes on there), I'm most active there. 

Anyway, this is very off topic, but, every year I do my best to raise awareness how ever I can! I'm asking everyone please read to the end... 

SEPTEMBER IS CHILDHOOD CANCER AWARENESS MONTH! Gold is the color that represents it. I know thinking about kids going through cancer is absolutely awful. Something no one wants to think about. But. That's the problem!! Kids need us grownups to help support them. Funding for research for all the forms of cancer is woefully low. Just 4% if ALL the funding given by the NCI goes to "childhood cancers"...all adult cancers are individualized... Breast cancer, pancreatic cancer, colon cancer, etc etc... But childhood cancers are all lumped together for funding... Which is crazy because there are way too many types kids can get! 

Please don't ignore that kids do get cancer & they need our help!

Every year in the US, about just under 16,000 children (birth to age 19) will be diagnosed with some form of cancer. That's about 1 in every 285 kids!! Around the world it's about 300,000 diagnosed yearly!!!! So, don't believe it if you hear childhood cancers are rare. They are not! Every 3 minutes a family will hear that there child has cancer. And there hearts break, they have to muster there strength, and they all will begin the battle of their lives for their little one. Kids really are tough but they shouldn't have to be THAT tough. 

Researchers work hard, but funding isn't enough. And, sadly, many young kids who do get treatment & able to go into remission will sadly experience problems later in as a result of those treatments (which sometimes even cause other types of cancers later in life!). 

Please don't look away. Please think about this. Please Go Gold for the kids all this month!! Please SHARE what you've read here. Please donate if you can... Seriously, every bit helps!! 

If you are interested in donating, consider Dana Farber Cancer Institute (I know someone who works there helping to get those trials for researching treatments for kids all set up, she's amazing & they do fantastic work there!) / the Jimmy Fund (on their site you can actually choose where you'd like your donation to go to help!). "Curesearch" also does amazing work! "St Baldricks" works to help in so many ways, including helping families! "The Diamond Fund" (via Hershey Medical & Penn State) also helps families!! And "NEGU" (negu.org), which stands for Never Ever Give Up, is an amazing group that was created by a young girl named Jessica Rees from Southern California - who was fought her own cancer, DIPG, which is always fatal & absolutely brutal. While she was in & out of the hospital, so ill herself, actually thought about all the other kids she saw, kids younger than her, stuck in hospital beds & missing out on being kids. She asked her parents to help her create what she called "Joy Jars", little containers that she filled with fun toys & other items, each themed for different ages/genders. Her idea expanded with the help of her family & friends & it grew to what it is now... Joy Jars are created & delivered to children in cancer wards at hospitals across the country! Amazing right? 

Now, if I young girl going through her own battle with one of the most brutal kinds of cancers could turn her focus to helping others, surely we can too!!

Again, please share what you've learned here. Please GO GOLD ALL SEPTEMBER for the kids! Please donate if you can & please don't just look away because it's hard to think about... Those kids need our help! 

If you've gotten to this point - THANK YOU, YOU ROCK!! 

I'll end this long post with my favorite quote... 

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It's not." - Dr Seuss

 

[Oompaloompa197878]

Oy, 2 things... 

1) Oofty to my typos/errors, I have no idea if I can edit after posting. I do know the difference between there/their 🤦‍♀️😂, but when typing fast my auto fill on phone gets a mind of its own! 

2) I forgot to mention Ronald McDonald House! Many families have to travel all over to find treatments for their children. That gets expensive very quickly (imagine having to leave home, go to a city you don't know, worrying about your child, & having to think about how you're even going to afford all the travel costs, hotel/motel costs long term). Ronald McDonald House provides housing for those families!! 😊 😊 😊 

 

(ok, again, thank you for reading!)