The early days part 2 .... Lucy and Over the Wall

4 minute read time.

When I was told that I was going to a summer camp to be with other children who had also gone through cancer and other serious illnesses, I was embarrassed and fought back at it for about three months. If you have had childhood / teenage cancer there are a multitude of organisations, initiatives and groups which are opened up to you so you don’t feel alone. But they aren’t always right for everyone.

But I was 14 so my response from the ultimate fact that at that age everything is embarrassing. 

The Camp Director phoned me and somehow managed to connect with me and I knew at this point that anyway, it was all organised so I had to go. I shyly went off genuinely worried what was about to happen.

I walked into the room I was sharing with two other girls and one of them turned around and said bluntly “So what’s wrong with you?”

I explained I had had cancer, but I was now in remission and was fine. She seemed taken aback by it and said to me “Oh my God I’m so lucky, that must have been so difficult”. That seems like a reasonable response perhaps, then she explained why she was at camp.

Lucy had been born with a rare heart defect, her whole life had been affected by it and she was always in and out of hospital. Sadly she died years later, when we were 18 years old. She had had open heart surgery which they hoped would give her a new lease of life, but after she came round from the operation, her body couldn’t cope with trauma and she passed away.

After that first conversation we became friends straight away. It was amazing how within minutes this girl had managed to dissipate all of my own stuff going on in my head and yet at the same time, in an instant gives me the understanding I was craving, but still feel so positive about her own situation.

She had a true skill of being natural empathetic and she put a smile on everybody’s faces. She was loud, Welsh and cheeky with a brilliant sense of humour. She is also the reason how I managed to find positivity in my own situation. She kicked me up the behind within minutes of meeting her, and I’m very grateful for the opportunity to have been a part of her life.

The organisation itself provides residential summer camps for children with serious illnesses, and spring camps for the siblings of these children. It is run by people who have a brilliant knack of giving the children and young people the empathy they need, but also creating a healthy environment where serious illness is not the focus but it’s not ignored. I had found the right place to be.

I went on to volunteer with the organisation in different ways and was invited to sit on a board to advise on various aspects of the camp. The volunteers who were there when I was 14 I am still in touch with, and have a great fondness for, some of them have become friends for life.

The friendships I made then, in a cheesy way, were the friends that understood without me having to explain myself and without coming up a brick wall every time you wanted to talk about it.

Automatic empathy without fear of judgement is a very powerful thing.

As a volunteer it was a personal learning process about letting go and understanding other people’s experiences. At times it struck a raw nerve and working with children who were younger than I was, but who had had the same cancer but whose outcome was different was difficult to stomach.

However it taught me the importance of separating my own experience from others. On the surface it’s similar, but it’s still individual. It gave the skill of being able to stand back and see it from another person’s point of view. I wasn’t focused on myself and it taught me a lot about life.

It was also over those years where I realised that I had something here, which is needed by other people and which I could hopefully shape into something worthwhile.

What was the point in me going through that so young if I couldn’t use it to motivate me?

There’s nothing I can do about having had cancer, there’s nothing I could have done to stop all the horrible things that happened physically and emotionally, I couldn’t control the impact it had on my body. So I could either dwell on that, or take it as a blessing that I can control my future and how I feel about the experience.

Reluctantly being drafted in to go to this summer camp with my adolescence blaring was a turning point and without that experience and those interactions I would have been shaped differently from my own cancer. I wouldn’t have been humbled by people’s honesty, kindness, empathy and the children I met and worked with later on.

If you are someone who has experienced cancer it’s not always right for everybody, and you have to deal with it in your own way but in the coping process it can be so special to find your own Lucy and your own Over the Wall outlets for coming to terms with it.

You can’t change the situation, but you can shape the way you think and feel about so it doesn’t drag you down, so you rediscover yourself and your own experience becomes empowering. It also helps not having to explain to the metaphorical ‘brick wall’ how you feel about the situation. 

Anonymous