JULIA IS AN EFFERVESCENT, GROUNDED, AND WISE 17 YEAR OLD WHO IS IN REMISSION FROM HODGKIN’S LYMPHOMA. JULIA SHARES HOW FRIENDS OF KAREN SUPPORTED HER AFTER HER JANUARY 2021 DIAGNOSIS.

“When I got the diagnosis, I wasn’t just worried about my health. I worried about my younger brother Xavier and how all of this would impact him. I’m a person who loves to talk about everything and put it all out there, but my brother is more closed off. I worried about the burdens this would place on Xavier and on my parents.

My parents are both extremely hard working and I worried about the time needed to bring me to the hospital. I also knew treatment is expensive when things aren’t covered by insurance. My mom is an ER nurse and she had to take six months of family leave to be with me during treatment. It was a tremendous toll on my parents, but they were great. My mom was always positive and fun, and my dad would cook for us.

I was being treated during my junior year, the most important year and I really had “chemo brain” that made it difficult to concentrate and study. I have a little of that Type A personality so I thought ‘OK, I can do this. I have treatment from 8:00 AM to 6:00 PM, then I have three hours to do all my work, I’ll sleep a little and then I’ll get up early to finish studying.’ But that did not work because I couldn’t think straight.

I learned that to be positive, you first have to accept your reality. Even though I’m here and healthy now, I did go through some sort of grieving process and went through all the stages including denial and anger.

I was isolated sometimes because I didn’t feel like anyone knew what I was going through and I didn’t want to make my parents sad, stressed or more overwhelmed. Some people shut me out because they didn’t know how to approach me. I had also just moved, and it was the pandemic, so I had no friends for support. Even post treatment I still missed a lot of school for appointments and sickness, so it was really hard to form connections in my new school.

It was great having Melissa, a Friends of Karen sibling support specialist. I am so grateful for Melissa. I could open up to