Cameron, indeed, was a special young man. Although he was a normal teenager, he quietly stood out from the crowd. He was the kid who was always willing to help, whether it was Mom or Dad, his sisters, grandparents, teachers, friends, or even people he did not know. He could see things from perspectives that no one else could see. He was polite, confident but modest, an excellent student, a swimmer, and a passionate runner. He was a leader when someone needed to be led, a motivator when someone needed a push, a cheerleader for those ahead of him as well as those behind him, and a ray of sunshine on a cloudy day. Appropriately, his favorite color was yellow! He loved to create, build, tinker, and could answer any question about computers presented to him!

Cameron had thick wavy light brown/blonde hair and the brightest sparkle in his steel blue eyes. He loved to dance around the kitchen, run in the rain, and gave the greatest hugs! Despite multiple food allergies about which he never complained, he loved to eat and cook and spent countless hours in the kitchen creating his own specialty dishes, determined his allergies would not define him. His favorite foods were meat (especially bacon), Brussels sprouts, asparagus (he was allergic to most “normal” kid vegetables), pretzels and lemonade!

Cameron loved being with family on holidays or outings. He loved Disney World and science fiction and action-adventure movies. Star Wars was a favorite. One year he insisted on being Yoda for Halloween…What a great Yoda made he! Another year he dressed in black and outlined his body with glow sticks so that he looked like a stickman, or a character from the movie Tron, walking around in the dark of night. He imagineered his own comic books, designed his own website, built a personal dumbwaiter in our great room, maintained his own workbench for projects, learned to solder, and loved gadgets and electronics of all kinds! He loved numbers and money. He was a saver but would be the first to give you the last dime in his pocket.

Before Cameron was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia, he had what most people would have considered a cold. He had asthma, but it had always been fairly well controlled. He was running five or six miles a day at cross-country practice. He was tired, but still running his best, coming in 1st or 2nd in every race. He would finish his race, then turn around and cheer everyone else on. He would even go back to run with his slowest teammate until he, too, crossed the finish line.

After diagnosis, Cameron was actually most concerned about how his friends were going to handle the news. He sent messages to them that indicated he was going to be just fine. He would be treated, and he would go on with his life. Because of his treatments, he was isolated from his relatives and his peers, but managed to keep contact by email, phone, text, Facebook, and FaceTime. Once he felt up to it, he started posting his journey on his website, but always had something inspirational to say about his challenges of the day, his “hills” as he called them, comparing everything, of course, to his running. Ironically, he was the one who was sick, and he was helping everyone else through it! He complained little about the pain, saying he felt “discomfort,” even though we all knew it had to be more than that!
 
He remained passionate about running throughout his experience with cancer. He would work out at home as well as in the hospital, lapping around the nurses' station when he wasn’t confined to his room due to lack of an immune system, challenging the therapists to come up with ideas to keep him fit so he would be able to get out with the team come next fall. When he lost the ability to walk after a two week stay in the ICU, he was determined he would regain his strength. And he did…. enough to stand and walk with a walker, even take a few steps on his own. One step closer to getting back on the course. He tried to share his passion for running by remotely designing, with his physical education teacher, a 1-mile cross-country run that middle school students could do instead of doing their required “boring” mile on the track. He wanted everyone to feel what he felt when he ran…the excitement, the freedom, and the joy!

He kept up with schoolwork by using homebound tutors and an occasional Skyped class, completing his requirements for 8th grade before the end of the year. He was accepted to the Downingtown STEM Academy, a new International Baccalaureate high school in town, an aspiration since he first heard about the school being conceptualized 2 years earlier. When he found out he was a candidate for a bone marrow transplant, although he could not attend events themselves, he signed right on to the idea of bone marrow drives, even after a donor was identified for him, and championed for people to sign up to be put on the registry. Although somewhat shy about it, when his friends wanted to sell bracelets that said “Cure4Cam”, he agreed, knowing that they needed to do something to feel as if they were helping. And they were. They were rallying behind him, praying for him, supporting him.

Cameron spent the last 2 ½ months of his life in 3 hospitals on multiple caustic protocols as we watched this cancer take over his body, but not his spirit. He crossed his final finish line on May 29, 2012. His funeral was packed with love and full of yellow. Our hearts ache every day for him. Cameron had done so much to help others throughout his own illness that, after his passing, although he became freed from cancer, we felt we needed to help others become cancer-free. The Cure4Cam Childhood Cancer Foundation was started by friends and family in his memory and was a long-standing charity partner of Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation (ALSF). After 12 years of raising research funds in Cameron’s memory via Cure4Cam, we have shifted our efforts to a Heroes Fund as part of ALSF. We remain passionate about raising funds to support the development of new and more humane cancer therapies for children, for although we did not choose this cause to fight, we do choose, every day, to fight for this cause.