Raising Awareness

I am so proud of my CHERUB.  Yesterday was his school science fair.  We thought long and hard on his project.  Did he want to do an experiment or do some sort of display?  With everything he's been through, he is a walking science fair project himself  He finally decided that he wanted to make his project about CDH.  As he stated "I want people to know about me".  Talk about wanting to raise awareness!

He read books about the human body, especially about the lungs and diaphragm and how they worked.  We pulled up information from the CHERUBS website about what a diaphragmatic hernia was, treatment options and how it is diagnosed.  I read that information to him, highlighting the areas he thought were important.  We talked about his scars, what happened to him in the hospital, well, basically his story.

Then the big day finally arrived.  We pulled out a box with a brand new feeding tube and a trache to use as visuals. I think I was more nervous than him.  The judges reviewed the projects during the day, allowing time for each grade to make their rounds through the projects.  At 5:30pm family members were allowed to walk through the fair with awards being announced at 6:30pm.

We had talked about the fact that there were only 3 awards and 5 projects for his grade.  He was pretty confident that he would win something.  I just wasn't as sure.  I knew that he learned something about CDH and himself plus raised awareness so I was happy.  Imagine all of our surprised when it was announced that he won 2nd place!  He looked so great walking up to get his ribbon while wearing his CDH Super Hero t-shirt.

So how much awareness was raised?  His school has approximately 670 students and 70 staff members.  There were about 150 participants in the fair.  If you think of each student at the fair having two parents (or more) come to visit plus friends and extended family, that equals out to a lot of people.  What I did find surprising was there were two families there that knew about CDH.  One met someone in the hospital two years ago while the other had a nephew with CDH. 

What did I learn from this?  You can raise awareness in all different ways, even when you are 7 years old.

Way to go, Buddy!!!