I think advocacy for pediatric cancer is so important to me because cancer has quite literally shaped me into the person I am today. It has endowed me with a unique perception and gratitude of the world I live in and life I lead. It has brought me to some of the people I now hold most dear and has also taken some of those people away. Cancer has been a consistent force throughout my life, as it has for many other children out there. It is unforgiving and unfair, and damages many people, not just its victims. In my opinion advocacy is so important because people deserve to see the damage it does, but they also deserve to see the people it cannot break. They deserve to see each and every child out there that fights such a monstrosity with such vigor and courage and deserve to see the unrelenting strength they display. My pictures, in my opinion, scream success and beauty. While cancer may have been such a malevolent force in my life, it has not taken away my spirit. I am proud to be a survivor and proud to speak up for others alike. I stand in solidarity with other pediatric cancer patients and survivors, and I say “FIGHT!”
Photography has given me a chance to try and capture some of the endless beauty and fascination I see around me every day. While I am still very new and unexperienced at it, I now am falling in love with it and hope to learn more about it as my relationship with it grows. I hope to share it with others, mainly other patients and survivors, and reveal to them that there is indeed beauty around them. They can capture it and tell their own stories.