Write about a moment when you felt you had the power to make a difference in someone else's life.
A moment I felt I had the power to make a difference in someone else's life was when I was volunteering for a foundation I was a part of as a host for a cancer family. It was a little girl named Kathy, and she had been recently diagnosed. Once the doctors diagnose you, it's a blur of hospital visits, stress, and fear. This foundation aimed to give the whole family a chance to relax.
Cancer is a disease that affects the whole family. My parents spent most of their time with Kathy's parents, and I was with her and her sister. I made sure they had fun and basically chaperoned them at the place we were at, which was the Great Wolf Lodge. Honestly, I had a lot of fun with those two girls, and having had cancer myself I think it helped them relate and relax more than they would have with a random person. Not to mention they didn't speak English, so we helped translate.
They were really shy at first, the whole family I mean. My dad has talked about it before but he has regretted being too proud to look for financial help in foundations and stuff. So we tried hard to make this family feel welcome because we had experienced what they had. You could tell Kathy's parents didn't want to be there at first like they were ashamed of it. But by the end, however, they were actually smiling and looked relieved that the girls were having fun.
I remember taking Kathy down this big water slide over and over again. I had convinced her to try it and she was scared at first, but she had so much fun she would drag me back up more times than I can count. Both of the girls cried when the week was over. They literally clung to me and wanted to stay. I was glad we had managed to give them this fun, a break from all the scary stuff. Even if it was only for a week.
A little later, my Mom told me Kathy had passed. The only family photo they had of her smiling, was the one we took of them at the end of the week. I promised myself to keep doing things like this, be it to raise money for childhood cancer research, or giving families like Kathy's just a moment to catch their breath, doing something nice can make the difference is someone else's life.
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