Photo by: Nancy Rokos

FLORENCE – After diagnosis and surgery for a brain tumor at age 13, Brie Carroll of Florence didn’t really see the point of going a camp for kids with cancer.

“I fought my mom. I just thought it was kind of dumb. I thought there was no point,” said Carroll, now 19 and a psychology major at Burlington County College.

Feeling depressed and distanced from her friends, Brie nevertheless went to Ronald McDonald Camp in Greely, Pa., and found a big surprise – people like her.

“You could hang out and not even realize that you were sick,” said Carroll, listing biking, crafts, golf and lakeside fun as activities at the camp, which is for children with cancer. She said she keeps in touch with fellow campers through email and yearly reunions.

Six years later and cancer-free, Carroll is helming a nonprofit that helps pediatric oncology patients spend a week each summer just being a kid. She started Brie’s Buddies right after her own cancer ordeal and has since raised $80,000 to fund stays at Ronald McDonald Camp and Camp No Worries, a YMCA-affiliated camp in Tabernacle for kids who have cancer or siblings with cancer.

On Monday, Carroll reminisced at Hanover Golf Club in Wrightstown, where the sixth annual Brie’s Buddies golf fundraiser took place. This year’s event drew nearly 140 entrants.

She said her father Joe, a golfer, came up with the idea, and her family members — mom Kim, brother Joey, 17, and sister Delaney, 9 — help out with the coordination. Joey, a Hodgkin’s Lymphoma survivor, solicited businesses for gift baskets that were auctioned.

 “It kind of all came together,” said Carroll.

Her father remembers the effect camp had on his daughter.

“She came back a changed person — her attitude, her outlook on life. Everything had changed.”

It was on the ride home from camp that she thought of the idea to help others like her, he recalled.

The fundraiser each year has drawn an average of 120 golfers, many who work in law enforcement or the state Department of Corrections, said Joe, a retired sergeant who worked in the state’s prison system for 26 years.

He served as president of Brie’s Buddies until this year, when his daughter was old enough to take on the responsibility, he said.

Taking cue from his sister, Joey has signed on to be a counselor at The Hole in the Wall Gang Camp, for children with cancer and blood diseases, in Lake Luzerne, N.Y.

“It’s amazing what they do,” he said of pediatric oncology camps.

Delaney has also gotten into the action, making and selling duct-tape hair adornments to help out Brie’s Buddies.

Joe and Kim Carroll are understandably in awe.

“They are amazing, amazing children,” said Kim.

For more information about Brie’s Buddies and how to donate, visit www.briesbuddies.org.

Jeannie O’Sullivan can be reached at 609-871-8068 or josullivan@phillyburbs.com

Reposted with Permission from author and photographer