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There isn't much most of us wouldn't do for a little kid with cancer. We'll shave our heads, open our wallets, sell lemonade, really, the list goes on. Whatever it takes to help a child in need, we'll do. They deserve it. But a 5-year-old boy with leukemia doesn't want our help. He wants to help others.
Leland Camara just became the kid with perhaps the most amazing wish to ever make its way into the offices of the Make a Wish Foundation. After months of his community showering his family with support, the Alaska tot asked for help from the non-profit that makes dreams come true for sick kids. He wanted them to help him give back.
Are you weeping yet?
Their answer was to send Leland's family from Alaska to Disneyland, but before he left, to let him help out at Kid's Kitchen, a program that provides free meals to children living in poverty. He literally walked around with plates of food in his hand, passing them off to kids who might have gone hungry if it weren't for the program.
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Little Leland's story would probably have set me off on a crying jag on a regular day. But it just so happens that I read about him on the same week that I met the people behind Kids Rocking Cancer, a non-profit developed not only to support kids like Leland and help their families with fundraisers but specifically to address the emotional issues unique to children looking at cancer. Kids don't deal with this disease the way adults do. Keeping it together like Leland isn't the norm.
Video of him is striking. It shows a little boy whose parents have not only done a wonderful job raising a child who understands what it means to care about people, but they've had the unenviable task of watching their child fight cancer. If I were in their shoes, I'm not sure I would have managed both at the same time. I don't have much use for bratty, spoiled kids, but when a child has cancer, I give them a pass. I say let them be spoiled, let them be bratty, let them have everything they want and more!
And yet, Leland's parents have managed to avoid that trap. With their sick little boy, they've somehow managed to do better than countless parents who haven't had the challenge of chemotherapy and hospital visits. There's a lesson in there for us all, isn't there?
If you don't think you can raise a child who understand what it means to give back, you aren't trying hard enough.
Watch Leland in action:
If your child were Leland, what do you think they would wish for?
Image via KSL
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