This Halloween is going to be different for everyone …. Maybe the scariest one ever faced.

Staying in may be necessary but in my family it’s no reason to sit back. We are using these challenging times to invite our hometown community to raise up and join our pledge to do good in not so good times.

Our Ask: For local families and friends to use the money that would normally be spent on candy, costumes, and decorations and- INSTEAD- donate it to SickKids.

Be it $5, $10, $15 or $300- like my mom, every dollar is a step closer for another child to recovery. Maybe they’ll see another birthday, Halloween or Christmas because of you. Maybe just another day with their families to fight.

My Story: 14 years ago almost to the day we got the call a bed had opened at SickKids.

At the time I was loosing a battle to a disease that almost took my life. Our local outpatient clinic gave us help but no hospital. McMaster gave us a hospital but no hope. From a healthy 13 year old in the spring, I turned into a 65lb skeleton by fall. Still loosing weight, I was discharged from Mac to see my family for what seemed to everyone like it may be the last time. I was sent home to wait... for a bed at SickKids, my flight to a treatment facility in Arizona, or my family to run out of time.

In the final hours... we got the call.
Never did I think I would look back and be so happy to hear the words- “you’re admitted to SickKids”.
A few more grueling months in hospital, a close relapse, and an outpatient until my 18th birthday; they never gave up on me. My bittersweet journey started at 13 and after 14 more years of life, I can say my battle was won the day I was admitted. 

SickKids saved my life.

The Need: To strive for a world class hospital is great, but to strive for a hospital
of miracles is greater.

Everyday SickKids fights to turn the imagined impossible into potentially possible. To some families it’s a journey that never ends, while others, one that is never won. SickKids’ provides families with hope whose options and time are running thin. The care they provide for kids is beyond medicine, it’s love and laugher, it’s the lengths they go to ensure everyday is a day closer to a cure.

~ to every patient, parent and practitioner that walks through those doors- you are all warriors  <3