Summer Camp More than Just Time Away from Home for Kids with Cancer

Summer camp just wouldn`t be right without swimming, fishing and camp fires. But for children fighting cancer, those are activities that don`t come around often without a little help. Twelve-year old Greg is spending his 3rd year at Camp Quality in Bald Knob, where he gets to do the stuff he loves. But not all of Greg`s play time, is fun time. "I either end up fracturing something or getting a cut or breaking something," Greg explains. "It stinks. If you break your arm, you can`t go swimming, hurt you leg, you can`t walk around and stuff." That`s because Greg`s bones are weaker than most kids, since he`s in remission after a fight with cancer. "He was diagnosed with lymphoma when he was four," says his mother, Terry. Their last name`s are being withheld for privacy. "We`ve had a dislocated shoulder, broken arm, twice." Like many of the children at Camp Quality, Greg has spent months at a time in the hospital and been through chemotherapy and radiation treatments. "A lot of what we see is leukemia, leukemia`s the big one and the tumors," explains camp director Mike Janusz. Camp Quality gives them a break from the big problems these little people face. "To get them a week away from the medical jargon, get them a week away from the hospital it`s a week they can just be a kid," Janusz said. And a week at camp, comes with all the fun and games other campers play. Greg explained to his Camp Companion, John Christopher, that he`s not hanging his swimming trunks outside to dry this year, since last year the girls took them and ran them up the flagpole. Here, the kids get the opportunity to meet others who have the same problems. "When they do come here, it`s a whole new world for them and to see them and the happiness that we bring them, that`s why I keep coming back," said Janusz. It is also why kids like Greg, keep coming back too. The kids` brothers and sisters also spend the week at camp with them. Everyone has their own camp counselor, giving them the one-on-one attention brothers and sisters sometimes miss when a sibling is fighting cancer. This year`s theme is W.O.O.S.H, for Wacky Out Of Sync Holidays. Every day this week is a different holiday of the year. Sunday is Halloween, so the kids and counselors came dressed in costumes.