It’s all about giving.
Anyone who has opened a gift from a child knows the held-breath anticipation and anxious look of the child’s face as he awaits your reaction.
As much as children love the “getting” on Christmas morning, they love the “giving” even more.
But some kids can’t go to mall and experience the sights, the sounds and the “giving” of Christmas.
For the patients at Kosair Children’s Hospital, many of whom have compromised immune systems due to treatments for cancer and other illnesses, going shopping isn’t an option.
Or it wasn’t until three years ago, when Geri Sasser, then a nurse in the oncology unit at Kosair Children’s, got $100 from her pastor at Northeast Christian Church and was told to make something big happen – a “pay it forward”-type instruction.
So Sasser used the money to print fliers, asking for donations of new and gently used items for a Santa Shop, where the patients can go and pick out gifts for family and friends.
The first year, only the patients in the cancer care and renal center, those with chronic illnesses that are in the hospital frequently or for an extended period of time, were able to participate.
But by the program’s second year, there were enough donations to open it up to all of the children in the hospital – more than 50 patients last year.
“The Santa Shop is important for the children in the hospital, because as everyone knows, being in the hospital during the holidays isn’t fun,” said Keri Shain, marketing manager for Kosair Children’s Hospital.
“We do everything we can to make it as normal as possible, and shopping at Christmas time is normal,” she said.
Read more at voice-tribune.com
