What is Project Thrive?
Project Thrive was founded to help combat the fear and confusion that a cancer diagnosis brings. Its primary focus is teenagers and young adults ages 13-21. Our goal is to provide newly diagnosed cancer patients with comfort and knowledge. We do this through a care package that includes a pamphlet that contains advice and stories from cancer fighters and survivors. Each item in the package has been chosen to ease the hardship of a diagnosis.
As I went through treatment and learned more about the cancer community I knew I wanted to help. Once I was in remission I immediately wanted to give back to the community that had given me so much strength and support. I always try to raise awareness in my everyday life by spreading information about pediatric cancer, but I wanted to do more. My first big step into giving back and advocating was at my high school. I created a presentation which I gave during spirit week. It outlined the hardships of pediatric cancer and how it is treated as a minority in the world of cancer. Over the course of a week my school raised $1,500 dollars for a local pediatric cancer charity, Fighting Children's Cancer Foundation.
I also did a commercial for Fighting Children's Cancer Foundation to raise awareness for their mission. I was lucky enough to have gone to Capital Hill the past two years to advocate for the STAR Act, a pediatric cancer bill, with the Alliance for Childhood Cancer. When I decided to pursue my Gold Award for Girl Scouts I knew I wanted to do something that would help the community that had helped me.
When I was thinking over what I had gone through and what I could do to help others I thought of how isolated and scared I felt in the beginning of my treatment. I felt that no one understood what I was going through. In my head my friends wouldn't understand what it was like to have a deadly illness, adults wouldn't be able to relate to having to miss school and be away from friends, and the other kids in the hospital were too young to grasp the magnitude of what was happening to us. Now that might not have been completely true, but to me I felt that I handle my diagnosis by myself. Any advice given to me by adults I brushed away and I ignored my friends thinking I just had to get through my six months of treatment and then I could resume life. When my treatment continued well after the six month mark I turned to my friends and the adults in my life for support. What a difference it made! looking back I wished i had done it earlier, so I want to make sure that teens who are diagnosed with cancer are given a resource that shows them that they are not alone.
That is where Project Thrive comes in. This has already grown to be much more than a Gold Award project to me. I hope to continue this even after I earn my Gold Award. The project will be giving care packages to newly diagnosed teen cancer patients. It will have a pamphlet that compiles the stories and advice of current and cancer patients as well as some advice from their parents. I hope that it will show each person that they are not alone while helping them deal with the challenges that cancer can throw their way. The other items in the care package will be there to provide a small respite from treatment as well as bring some comfort.
