A cancer support group for children doesn't sound fun, but kids are 'having a blast' at a Green Bay hospital
GREEN BAY − When Stu imagined what a cancer support group would look like for children, he envisioned a somber scene: kids sitting around a circle, crying and wrecked by grief.
He didn't want to expose his four young children to that, but he needed to give them a higher level of support. His wife, and their mother, had been diagnosed with kidney cancer a year and a half ago, and though Stu and his wife both had candid conversations with them about the disease and future treatment plans, group work felt like the obvious next step.
"We're in a small rural community here, and no other kids — that they know of — have anything even remotely close to what they're dealing with," Stu said. "And I just wanted them to get an idea that they're not the only ones."
Stu, who requested the Green Bay Press-Gazette not use his last name for privacy reasons, had searched far and wide for a support group for children with loved ones going through cancer treatment. He reached out to local hospitals and churches across Brown and Outagamie counties, hoping such a support group existed for his children, ages 5, 7, 10 and 12.
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It just so happened that HSHS St. Vincent Children's Hospital in Green Bay was gearing up for the exact service Stu was looking for. The hospital is primed with child life specialists, health care providers who are specially trained to work with children of all ages so they can have the experience all kids deserve — regardless of circumstances.
Between 2014 and 2018, 6,799 residents in Brown County alone have been diagnosed with cancer, a number that still doesn't represent the sheer human toll one diagnosis takes on a single family.
That's part of why, since the start of November, HSHS St. Vincent Children's Hospital has been host to a free support group for children 5 to 12 impacted by cancer. The Youth Cancer Support Group meets on the first Tuesday of each month from 6 to 7:30 p.m. at HSHS St. Vincent Children's Hospital.
"It just really is helpful and important for these kids to know what's going on with someone that they love, to know what's going on," said Caitlin Kapp, a certified child life specialist at HSHS St. Vincent Children's Hospital.
A typical session begins with free play, Kapp said, which allows children space to play with board games, fidgets, arts and crafts, interactive tablets and a whole gamut of activities. This period of the session is unstructured on purpose, with the intention of giving kids opportunities to have fun and be themselves.
Free play eventually dovetails into a goal-oriented activity, although interacting with games remains part of the experience.
"It's in those crafts — making tangible things — that remind the kids what's in our control and also reminds them of things that are out of our control," Kapp said. "It's not just the conversation, we're pairing it with something that they can do to make it interactive, to help them understand. … We're giving these kids the play aspect, and those pieces to help be able to express emotion in a way that's appropriate for a child."
Trepidation turns to peace of mind
Stu's children have been attending Youth Cancer Support Group sessions since St. Vincent Children's Hospital started them, but he admits he was prepared to take the kids out early if it looked anything like how the media depicted support groups.
"I didn't want this to be just a bunch of people sitting around in metal chairs crying," Stu said. "I was very concerned at the first meeting that it would look like the type of support groups you see in movies."
At first, Stu's children didn't want to go. Nothing about "Youth Cancer Support Group" screamed fun exactly, but attending wasn't up for debate, Stu said. They all had to go and see for themselves what this was, and perhaps open their minds.
He elected to sit in on the first session to see how the specialists broached the subject of cancer. In lieu of metal chairs, the space was colorful and stocked with games that all of his kids could enjoy. Quickly, Stu understood the value of the sessions. And his kids, he said, are "having a blast."
The child life specialists put cancer into a language that everyone could grasp, and it helped, Stu said, to have another adult outside of him and his wife explain the different dimensions of cancer and treatment.
It might sound odd, but one way that the child life specialists educate the children on chemotherapy is through candy, Kapp said. They'll use candies to represent different parts of the body, with Red Hots symbolizing red blood cells. Mom is extra tired, they'll explain, because chemo treatment has taken away some of the Red Hots in her system.
"Being able to really put a visual with it, and using something that's not medical to help explain something that is medical, or something that they're familiar with like crafts, toys, things like that, to help connect to something that maybe they haven't talked about quite like that before," Kapp said. "They're able to really compare and understand at this level that's appropriate for children."
Kapp said the coping tools she and the other staff teach are meant to take back control, even if it feels impossible to have control over any part of a cancer diagnosis. For example, you may not be able to control how a parent or sibling responds to chemotherapy, but maybe you can give them something special to take with them to the hospital, be it a teddy bear or a memento.
Sometimes, control looks like scheduling a special bonding time between mom and son. Other times, control looks like squeezing a stress ball or playing with a fidget.
The support group has given Stu and his wife a bit more peace of mind. They recognize that having a parent with cancer will be a watershed event for the children, and they're mindful that communicating what to expect as frankly as possible will always be better than pretending it's not there.
Stu knows the importance of being a strong parent while his wife endures chemotherapy and future prognoses. At the same time, the gravity of their situation is not lost on him. Most people don't confront the potential of death until later in life, Stu said, and even then, nobody necessarily has the "correct" tools to process grief.
"It's a journey that you have to guide them through. And if you're not doing that, what are you giving that kid to get through this?" Stu said. "This is something that most adults can't process. How do you expect a 5-year-old to have the mental bandwidth and grace to be able to get through something like that if you aren't there to guide them?"
Stu hopes more people can look past their associations with whatever the term "support group" calls up. And to see more parents helping their children confront the ins and outs of a cancer diagnosis.
The Youth Cancer Support Group meets again on Jan. 3. To sign up, or for more information, call 920-433-8641 or email childlife@hshs.org.
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Natalie Eilbert covers mental health issues for USA TODAY NETWORK-Central Wisconsin. She welcomes story tips and feedback. You can reach her at neilbert@gannett.com or view her Twitter profile at @natalie_eilbert. If you or someone you know is dealing with suicidal thoughts, call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 988 or text "Hopeline" to the National Crisis Text Line at 741-741.
This article originally appeared on Green Bay Press-Gazette: Green Bay support group helps children understand loved one's cancer
