Avery was diagnosed with a cancer in May 2020 at the age of four. As you can imagine it was an incredibly traumatic and sad time for her mum Lidia who was bringing up three young children on her own. I spent that year supporting and helping this young beautiful family through this traumatic event. I am happy to say that Avery has made a complete recovery, but it was one of the most painful sad and traumatising events that anybody could go through in their lifetime. I would go to the hospital after work to try and give Lidia a break and comfort Avery as best I could.
The pain in that little girl was so severe and all I could do was just sit on the hospital bed and hug her. We grew really close during that time. I’d see her every night and then we would do stuff on weekends. She was brave beyond belief. We would watch movies when she wasn't feeling too bad and on bad nights she would find some comfort in hugs when the pain was wrecking her body. Incredibly we found time to dance – a segment of the Wellness Quarter… I taught her the two step, lol. I still have the video. The kids made Easter hats and went outside to the park when we could. At that stage I had spent a lot of time researching nutrition and as such wasn't entirely happy with the food that Avery was eating as she battled through this treatment. As a treat for Avery, I was often asked to buy McDonald's kids meals which I did extremely reluctantly. I made two promises to her at that time. One was that she would always be my baby girl…. This was based on the fact that I would always greet her by asking her how's my baby girl. A promise that I will always hold true in this lifetime.
The second was that I would create a delicious kids menu for anyone going through a trauma such as hers. The special interest group in this case is tasked with creating a health optimising nutritional plan for children going through ill health as well as for general health.
Avery was very clear on her instructions... among everything else in the menu, the nuggets and chips have to be absolutely delicious.
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