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Canfield woman turns loss of son into helping parents, St. Jude's
CANFIELD
“I don’t ever want to have cancer, but if I do, this is where I want to go,” said Nick Avery of Canfield, amazed by what he saw during a 2005 tour of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital with his family.
“Nick, don’t say that,” said his mother, Wendy Avery, a St. Jude volunteer who had taken her husband, Steve, and Nick’s two older siblings to a Volunteer Appreciation Day at the Memphis-based hospital.
Just six months later, Nick was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia and less than a year after the diagnosis, he died in 2006 at 15.
Wendy, a licensed practical nurse, had quit her job to spend much of the year by her son’s side when he was ill. When he died, she came back home to grieve with the rest of her family.
“We had sent the kids home the night before he died because school was starting. He died hours later, in the middle of the night,” she said.
At the time of his death, Nick’s brother, Josh, now employed at the Rescue Mission of the Mahoning Valley, was 19, and his sister, Alisha Brownlee, now married, was 17.
Wendy and her family were helped by her sister, Judy Burkett of Medina County, whose son had died of cystic fibrosis.
“At that time, Nick was healthy, and I tried to support her. But when Nick died, she emailed me almost daily offering support and encouragement. She understood what I was going through,” said Wendy.
During a telephone interview with Wendy, who was at St. Jude in her role as chairwoman of the St. Jude Quality of Life Steering Council, she talked about Nick and what led to her becoming a volunteer leader at the hospital – helping families of patients cope and teaching staff how to deal with patients and families.
At Heartland Christian School in Columbiana, she said Nick was interested in sports but settled on acting, which she said he liked and was good at. He was a member of Tabernacle Evangelical Presbyterian Church in Austintown.
Wendy also talked about her son’s courage: “He never felt sorry for himself, even when it was just me and him,” she said.
It was her job as director of the Growing Place preschool, sponsored by Tabernacle Evangelical Presbyterian Church, that led her to St. Jude, and Nick’s death that got her more heavily involved in helping parents.
“No one fully understands until they experience the death of their child,” she said.
After raising her children, Wendy followed her predecessor at the preschool and conducted an annual Trike-a-Thon fundraiser for St. Jude. After the seventh fundraiser, she accepted an invitation from St. Jude to attend Volunteer Appreciation Day. Accompanied by her husband, Steve, a landscape architect at Mill Creek MetroParks, and their three children, she toured St. Jude and met some families.
After Nick died, she turned her grief into helping counsel other parents of pediatric cancer patients and efforts to help develop new ways to deliver health care to pediatric cancer patients and their families at St. Jude. St. Jude integrated quality-of-life care into the treatment model for pediatric cancer patients, and Wendy played a pivotal role in expanding the program.
“When Nick died, it hadn’t happened. But, we’ve come a long way in the last eight years. I’ve seen it grow from nothing to where it is today,” said Wendy, 54, a grandmother of four, a situation which she described as “pretty great.”
The parent mentor program pairs bereaved parents with recently or newly bereaved parents and provides training, now a required part of doctor’s orientation. The hospital follows up with parents at the death of their child and for years after.
“Bereaved parents created the program and its materials,” she said.
Wendy said spending time at St. Jude and encouraging others to get involved at St. Jude or elsewhere is therapy for her. “I don’t necessarily encourage them to do what I do, but I tell parents there is something they can do – something in every tragedy from which can come good,” she said.
While at St. Jude this trip, she helped provide training to a group of new doctors on how to give bad news to family, something she calls compassionate empathy. Also, all nurses are required to take 25 hours of instruction and training from these parents in the mentoring program.
“When I do that, I’m sharing real-life things. There is healing in talking about it. It helps me to this day,” she said.