Serving Critically Ill Children of United States Military Families
The Young's Family Story
Twelve hours after doctors diagnosed Cydney Young, then one-year-old, with Wilm’s tumor, Cydney and her mom, Crystal Young, boarded a plane from Portugal to Walter Reed Hospital. Two weeks later, Crystal’s husband (Technical Sergeant in the U.S. Army) and two kids joined the other half of the Youngs stateside to support Cydney as she went through rigorous chemo treatments, post-surgery.
“It’s an emotional roller coaster, so really all you have is each other,” says Crystal of the treatments and difficult times that followed for the military family.
What helped the family rediscover each other post-treatment and sans home? The Respite Housing and Hands On Adventures programs provided by the Believe In Tomorrow National Children’s Foundation, a Baltimore-based non-profit. This April is the Month of the Military Child, but at Believe In Tomorrow, every month is dedicated to military children.
Kristen and Cydney Young
In 2005, the foundation made the decision to prioritize military pediatrics in the respite housing program. The Young family is one of hundreds of military families served by Believe In Tomorrow and its programs.
Says Crystal of her children when they found out they would move with no notice: “They cried … we had finally gotten settled there [at the military base]. To have that ripped away from you and know you’d be moving in two weeks, that’s a lot for a kid.”
The Month of the Military Child, first celebrated in 1986, is especially important today as resilient families manage long separations, says Leslye A. Arsht, deputy under secretary for military community and family policy.
When the weekly chemo treatments subsided, Crystal and her husband, C.J. Young, took their children to stay at a Believe In Tomorrow beach respite home in July 2008.
“It marked one year since when we found out she [Cydney] was really sick,” says Crystal. “It was kind of a celebration of that, and it was a blast.”
At the beach, Crystal finally reserved one-on-one time with each kid, including a mother-daughter date with her oldest, Cristen, where she watched her daughter stand on a surfboard for the first time and ride the wave in.
The Youngs visited the beach respite property one more time – and went on a Hands On bull riding adventure – before Cydney graduated from the organization’s programs after being off active treatment for one year.
“We went from Portugal where the happening thing is a cow in the road to Washington, D.C. where there’s a traffic jam at every corner,” says Crystal. “You are so caught up in getting through that, so disconnected.”
She adds:
“I encourage any military family to go on a respite trip, even if it’s just for a weekend. It was so good for the family to be away from all those things and spend time together.”