Kids Supporting Kids

When it comes to coping with a parent's serious illness, Komen Kids offers peers a shoulder to lean on. Jon Wagner-Holtz, age 15, and Kelly Hill, age 16, back each other up in their support group, Komen Kids.

Kelly, an engaging presenter with a clear love for the work she and Jon founded, spent the week with us in Hawaii, along with her mother, Jane, a humorist and breast cancer survivor.

Jon was 9 when he found out his mother had cancer. "I knew something was up because she was crying a lot," explains Jon. "When she told me she had breast cancer, I was like 'big deal' because I thought it was like a cold. Then I realized it was a very big deal -- and I felt totally alone. I cried myself to sleep a lot."

More than a million kids hear the devastating news each year that their mother or father has a serious illness. Jon, whose mother was working as a volunteer for the local chapter of the Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation, had an idea for how to help himself and others. He applied to the chapter for a grant. Once the grant was approved, he sent out 150 letters to the children of chapter members, asking for help. Kelly, then 12 years old, heard about Jon's project and decided to help.

Jon, Kelly, and three other kids named their organization Komen Kids, for the parent organization. They set up a phone line, staffed 24 hours a day, seven days a week, but volunteer kids. The first line went into Jon's bedroom. "Our main goal," says Kelly, was to let other kids know they are not alone."

As president and vice president of Komen Kids, Jon and Kelly interviewed psychologists to facilitate their meetings and train them how to handle phone calls. "We learned to never say, 'Everything will be OK,' because we don't know that is necessarily true," Kelly explains. Jon and Kelly also took peer counseling classes. Monthly meetings now include a professional and nearly 200 kids; parents may not attend. Meetings include everything from social activities like roller blading and sailing, to group rap sessions in a nurturing, strictly confidential environment, allowing them to let loose and share their feelings. "That's when the tears start coming," says Kelly.

Komen Kids is now a nationwide organization, open to children of people with VHL and other cancer syndromes. For more information, call 1-800-IM-AWARE. Jon and Kelly, whose Moms are both in remission, continue to work with Komen Kids and to fight against breast cancer. Jon tells other kids who have a parent with cancer: "Don't hold things in; talk about how you feel because it will help." "I hope no other kids have to hear what I heard, that their parent has cancer, says Kelly. "But if they do, Komen Kids is here for them and they don't have to be alone."

As published in the VHL Family Forum, 4:3, September 1996. For permission to reprint, please contact the VHL Family Alliance, editor@vhl.org. Further information is available from the VHL Family Alliance, info@vhl.org.