Camp Rising Sun A Lifelong Experience

By Nancy K. Crevier

Nine-year-old Michaela Richmond is a vivacious, brown-eyed girl, with dark brown hair cut to brush just around her ears. Her smile is constant and her blushed cheeks belie that fact that in 2004 she was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia, a cancer of the blood that led to three years of intensive intravenous and oral chemotherapy. On August 4, Michaela, one of Tom and Kate Richmond’s three daughters, was particularly excited about the upcoming Camp Rising Sun session she will be attending August 23 to 28, the fifth time she has attended the Colebrook, Conn., camp for children with cancer and those in remission, such as herself.

“Michaela was always active,” said her mother, “even when she was undergoing chemotherapy. She could play outside and bike and run around with her friends.” What Michaela had to be wary of, however, were crowded indoor events or anywhere that her compromised immune system might be at risk. That meant that during the three years of cancer treatment, some activities had to be curtailed. Summer camp was not a possibility for a child who could go from apparently healthy one day to sick and in the hospital the next.

When Michaela’s oncologist, Dr Joe McNamara of Guilford, told the Richmonds about Camp Rising Sun, “She was so excited, I had to let her go,” said Ms Richmond, even though Michaela, just 4 years old at the time, had never been to a sleep-away camp.

Camp Rising Sun is an American Cancer Society-sponsored camp held at the YMCA Camp Jewel in Colebrook for one week each summer. The camp is free of charge to young cancer patients or survivors, and is staffed by “Dr Joe,” as well as nurses and medical staff from Yale Hospital in New Haven, with which Dr McNamara is affiliated. The camp provides all medical support for campers, from finger sticks to chemotherapy treatments to blood transfusions.

But the focus as the camp is not on the illness, but rather on the fun, said Michaela. “We do arts and crafts, swimming, horseback riding, theater, dance, and every year we have a barbeque and fireworks,” she said. She also looks forward to a yearly event that is not de rigueur at most summer camps — the Shave-athon. “Before the fireworks on the last night of camp, people get their heads shaved,” said Michaela.

The head shaving is a fundraiser for the camp with noncamper participants paying to have their hair shorn as all of the campers look on. “It’s really fun,” laughed Michaela.

Camp Rising Sun is for children who have or have had cancers of all kinds, and are at various stages of recovery. “Going to Camp Rising Sun has given Michaela a different spin on seeing kids and accepting people for who they are,” said her mother, “And,” added Michaela, “not what they look like.”

“It can be scary sometimes to see a child with no hair, or a prosthesis, or with a feeding tube in their nose,” said Ms Richmond. “Michaela has seen so much of it that she can see beyond it.”

The biggest benefit of Camp Rising Sun has been the diversity to which Michaela has been exposed, said Ms Richmond. “She meets different kids of different races and backgrounds, all with different kinds of cancers. She’s learned a very hard lesson very early in her life — that not everyone is perfect, but that everyone has their own gift to give. She’s an old soul after everything she has been through.”

Even though Michaela has been out of treatment for two years and will achieve survivor status with a clean check up this September, the camp is an opportunity for her to renew old friendships and to make new ones. Most of her camp friends are other youngsters that she met during the long hours of chemotherapy treatment at Dr McNamara’s office, and because they come from all parts of the state, camp is the only time she sees them outside of the office.

“I like Camp Rising Sun because I felt comfortable being with my friends that I’ve seen in the office, and the counselors, and knowing Dr Joe is there,” said Michaela.

The other special thing about the camp, said Ms Richmond, is that most of the counselors were once campers there themselves. “They can really relate to the kids because they have been there,” she pointed out.

Michaela is well enough that she could attend any camp now, but she elects to return to Camp Rising Sun each summer. “I like going back because every year they have different themes, and I love to do the theme night stuff,” Michaela said. Last year, she said, the theme was “Campers in Space” and the evening activities centered around aliens and fun activities like eating with light-up forks and knives. “I’m excited to see what they’ll do this year,” said Michaela, “because this year they have a Disney theme.”

Camp 2009 is “The Magical Campdon,” and according to camp literature, campers can look forward to a Pirates and Princesses Ball, a parade down “Main Street,” and cabins sporting scenes from Disney movies. Tinkerbell, Jack Sparrow, and Prince Charming may be on hand for registration day, as well.

Michaela is so enthusiastic about the camp that when visiting Dr McNamara for regular check-ups, he has often encouraged her to talk with parents and children at the office about her experiences. She was a speaker this past July at the American Cancer Society “Sailing for Hope” event in Litchfield, a fundraiser for all of the New England ACS-sponsored camps, talking about her experiences at Camp Rising Sun.

Michaela keeps busy during the rest of the year with activities that include gymnastics at Vasi’s in Newtown and American Football League cheerleading, and is excited to be entering Reed Intermediate School this fall as a fifth grade student, where she will add band to her list of activities. But always at the back of her mind is the week at Camp Rising Sun. “I start thinking about the next year the day after camp is over,” said Michaela.

She would one day like to be a counselor at the camp, she said. That does not surprise her mother, who said, “I don’t think she will ever go anywhere but Camp Rising Sun.”

For information about attending Camp Rising Sun, visit the website at camprisingsun.com or call 379-4762. The camp relies on donations to keep the program free for its campers. To donate, send checks to Camp Rising Sun, PO Box 1004, Meriden CT 06450-1004.