By Chris Lewis | Aug. 13, 2020
Amelia Vardy of Mount Pearl is making quite an impact at only 4-years-old.
Back in June of this year, her family hosted a series of blood donor clinic events in Mount Pearl and St. John’s in an effort to raise both numbers of people donating blood this time of year, and also awareness for the importance of blood donations.
Vardy was diagnosed with blood cancer two years ago; a moment her family will never forget, and one that proved to them the importance of blood donations. Their recent blood drives proved to be a success, even in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a total of 23 donations – more than double the original number of 10 they had expected.
Now, Vardy and her family have something else to look forward to this coming October.
Vardy, who turns five that month, has been named the Honoured Hero of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Canada for the province of Newfoundland. That means her story will be shared with the world through the organization.
Last year, Vardy and her family took part in Light the Night, an annual fundraising event hosted by the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society of Canada that, in Newfoundland, sees participants make their way around Paradise Park with lanterns, “lighting the night” in the name of fighting cancer.
Alongside doing some publicity with the organization, being named Honoured Hero means that Vardy will be in the spotlight at the next Light the Night event, currently set for October 17. Each year, the event gives center stage to someone telling their story of survival. Vardy’s mother, Veronica, said she hopes her daughter’s story of her diagnosis, treatment, and life with cancer will give listeners, especially those who are new to life with the disease as well as their family and friends, some hope for their future.
“She is living, and she is surviving, post-Leukemia diagnosis. We want to spread that hope to other people,” Veronica said, adding they even hope to conduct some hospital visits to other young cancer patients if the health guidelines allow for it.
Veronica admitted the family debated whether Amelia should take on such a big responsibility with this new honour. But when Amelia herself learned of the invitation, any doubt about whether they would do it went out the window.
“I don’t like to rush into things. I wanted to make sure we’d be able to get totally on board with all of the commitments. I was fleshing it out with my husband, and Amelia was in the family room and heard that we’d be going up on a stage and sharing her story, and she just got so excited,” Veronica said. “She said, ‘Mommy, I’ll go on stage! I’ll wear my chemo beads and tell everyone that I’m beating cancer,’ so that just sealed the deal for us.”
The chemo beads are part of a program run by the Janeway Children’s Hospital. For every treatment, procedure, visit, and everything in between, Amelia is given a bead to add to her collection, with different colours representing different procedures. The last time Veronica counted the beads, Amelia had accumulated over 350.
“It’s this long string that sort of represents everything she’s gone through, and that’s what she wants to wear around her neck. She wants to show everyone that she’s doing it, and they can too.”
Amelia is about a month away from her last day of chemo treatments.
“We’re on the verge of this all being over, hopefully,” said Veronica. “It’s exciting. A lot of the kids who were diagnosed around the same time as her are all, within the next few months, finishing up, so it’s a really exciting time for all of us moms.”
