My name is Ethan, and I live in Tustin, California. I was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia in October 2014 at 7 years old and finished treatment in February 2018. Reading was a huge part of how I coped and thrived through treatment, and when I didn’t feel good enough to read, my parents read to me. Reading helped me to keep thinking and keep learning, and it gave me something interesting to talk about with others. It also let me escape from my boring hospital room to so many other realistic and fantasy worlds. I really can’t imagine going through Leukemia without books and reading.
However, while being treated at CHOC Children’s Hospital in Orange County CA, I noticed that books and reading were missing from patients’ hospital experience, especially the oncology patients on the 5th floor. And, in all my time at the hospital, I never saw any other kids reading or being read to. The oncology nurses actually told me repeatedly that I was the only kid they ever saw reading.
So, along with my mom, I founded Ethan & Choco’s Book Club (ECBC) in December 2015 to make sure that hospitalized kids receive the tremendous cognitive and social benefits of reading that help them to thrive through treatment and beyond. Today, I am 17 years old, six years out of treatment, an avid reader, — and going on nine years of working hard to raise books, funds, and awareness in Orange County in order to continue to provide high-quality books and reading experiences for hospitalized kids.
If you are part of a group that might be interested in running a book drive or fundraiser and would like me to visit to share my story, please email me at Ethan@Ebookclub.com. Since I am in school, my availability is generally in the afternoons or evenings.