For those of you who went to BV last year, you may remember a story about a boy named Braden Hofen in the newspaper. This boy is fighting childhood cancer and his odds for living are very small. His family is cherishing every moment they’ve had with him and are always hoping for more.
According to the National Cancer Institute, about 10,700 new cases of cancer are expected to be diagnosed in kids 14 years and younger. Out of that number, about 1,340 deaths are expected.
I don’t know about you, but that number is way too high for me. I didn’t realize the impact cancer can have until I met Braden, who wasn’t even guaranteed to become a kindergartner. He has gotten that opportunity for now, but that’s only because of funding for childhood cancer research.
September is childhood cancer awareness month.
If these statistics could go down even more, why not do all we can to help?
Imagine your elementary school days. Making friends, playing on the playground, learning the alphabet.
But now imagine spending those days in the hospital, fighting for your life.
No child deserves that, which is why we should do all we can to raise money for cancer research.
Relay for Life is a great way to start.
Something even easier?
There is a group on Facebook attempting to spread awareness of childhood cancer, and get Oprah’s attention in the process. The goal of the group is to get enough members for Oprah to do a show about children’s cancer.
All this involves is a click of the mouse for you to join, and then another few clicks to invite all of your friends. We click many many times in a day to update people on what we’re thinking, phrases we like and comment on how pretty someone is in a photo.
Why not use a click to possibly improve the chances of a preschooler being able to learn their alphabet or count to ten?