Meet Caeleigh: 2023 Scholar
Our College Scholars receive a financial scholarship to help with academic expenses, and each scholar commits to undertaking a volunteer project of their choosing related to childhood cancer advocacy, with support and mentorship from the Children's Cancer Cause team.
“My diagnosis was overwhelming for me, for my parents, for my family. The suddenness and veracity of my cancer was completely shocking.”
Caeleigh’s Story
Caeleigh, a native of Norwood, Massachusetts, was diagnosed with acute promyeloid leukemia when she was twelve.
“I was a healthy, athletic twelve-year-old obsessed with swimming. I played soccer and lacrosse, but I loved to be in the pool,” she remembers. “Less than one week after I first noticed bruises on my shin, I was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia and was told that I would be hospitalized for the next seven months. A day or so later, we were told that I had a more rare myeloid leukemia called Acute Promyeloid Leukemia and I was asked to join a clinical trial that would require me to receive my chemotherapy protocol every day for the next ten months.”
It was important to Caeleigh that she be able to jump back into sports after treatment. In high school, Caeleigh was on three athletic teams and served as captain of the lacrosse team.
She’s also passionate about community service, “especially paying forward my experience as a pediatric cancer survivor.”
“What I learned during my days in treatment was that I am stronger than I had believed and that as bad as my situation was with monthly lumbar punctures and what felt like gallons of blood being drawn from me each day, there were other children in clinic who had it worse than me,” Caeleigh says.
Today, she’s studying nursing at James Madison University.
“It’s very important to me to spread awareness of pediatric cancers and the difficulties families endure when a child is diagnosed. I want to pay it forward to other families that are experiencing those hardships.”
Caeleigh’s Advocacy Project
“When a family member is diagnosed with cancer, particularly a child, no one focuses on the financial impact that can have on the family as a whole,” Caeleigh says. “There’s a stigma and a shame associated with asking for financial help due to a cancer diagnosis. But the reality is that it is difficult to pay the mortgage, car payments, and household utilities when parents can’t work during their child’s treatment.”
For Caeleigh’s volunteer project, she plans to put together a resource guide for newly diagnosed families focused on financial assistance.
“I don’t want any other families to worry about where the next meal or mortgage payment will come from,” she says. “I want families to get connected early on to resources that can help them so that they can focus on what is important: helping their loved one heal.”