Rainbows and smiles through all the difficult miles
BRYANSTON – The Rainbows and Smiles organisation needs your help to offer support to children fighting cancer and other life-threatening illnesses, as well as their families.
Thousands of children are affected by childhood cancer and other life-threatening illnesses each year, and their families struggle too. One local organistion is working to provide joy and necessities to help make the fight much easier.
As Bonita Suckling’s young son Jed battled anaplastic astrocytoma (a rare form of brain tumour), he found joy in giving away presents he had received to other children he knew who were also fighting cancer. Although Jed sadly passed away just before his seventh birthday, Suckling and the rest of the Rainbows and Smiles team have created a non-profit organisation to continue Jed’s legacy. Rainbows and Smiles, located in the Bryanston area, provides emotional, social and financial support to children fighting a life-threatening illness and their families.
“My little boy was diagnosed just before his fourth birthday and he loved to regift the gifts he got [while sick],” Suckling told the Fourways Review. “After he passed away, we wanted to give hope to sick children like he had.”
She therefore registered Rainbows and Smiles in 2011 to continue to distribute toys to children. Over the years, the organisation has expanded its work so that it can help families with an ill child meet their basic needs, such as helping to pay medical bills, afford electricity, buy groceries and more. They work across the country with any sick child and family that reach out to them.
“So many mothers with sick children have to make a choice: do I go to work in order to pay the bills, or do I stay with my sick child in the hospital, hold their hand and rub their back as they vomit [as a result of the side-effects of treatment]. We want to help with the former so that they can do the latter.”
Rainbow and Smiles works countrywide and in Gauteng has helped children being treated at the Tshwane District Hospital, Dr George Mukhari Hospital, a couple of Netcare institutions, Donald Gordon Hospital and Charlotte Maxeke Johannesburg Academic Hospital. They also work to raise awareness about childhood cancer and make the early warning signs of childhood cancer are more commonly recognised.
As a non-profit though, they are always looking for help from the public.
“We are always looking for financial donations as it is with this money that we can help families,” Suckling explained.
“We also need donations of toys, as we no longer buy any because the money could be better spent, we depend completely on donations from the public.
“People are welcome to host crazy sporting events in order to fundraise for us, or else they can join in our sporting events – we’re involved in the Comrades, the Midmar Mile, Iron Man and the Discovery 947 race.”
Other donations are welcome too, explained Nadia Lewis, Rainbow and Smile’s national project manager. Her child Hanno died from rhabdomyosarcoma, a rare form of cancer that forms in soft tissue.
“We’re always looking for crafts for the children in hospitals, and grocery vouchers are welcome as well so that families with a sick child can also have good, nutritious food at home.”
If you are unable to contribute funds or donations, you can still play a part. “In 2020 I’d like to see more people get involved in the community service biscuit project,” said Lewis.
“This project is aimed at schools and students and is a chance for schoolchildren to get their official community service hours done.”
Basically each participant receives a biscuit-making box which contains all the ingredients to make a batch of between 30 and 40 biscuits, as well as a packet and decorations so that the baked goods can be sold individually and create an income for the organisation.
“Participants benefit from this because it teaches them a skill (baking biscuits), raises awareness about childhood cancer, creates funds for our work and allows the children to get the paperwork to prove that they’ve completed community service hours. For each batch a child will be given four hours.
“People who wish to get involved are welcome to get hold of the organisation,” she concluded.
Details: www.rainbowsandsmiles.org.za; bonni@rainbowandsmiles.org.za; nadia@rainbowsandsmiles.org.za; 083 460 0999; 083 764 8109.
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