Happy Anniversary CFO Jessica Creager!

Everyone at Family House is delighted to celebrate our CFO, Jessica Creager, on the occasion of her 20th anniversary at Family House. Jessica is the hub of our wheel, making sure that our business/administrative office runs smoothly and efficiently. Far more importantly, Jessica’s sweet spirit of kindness and inclusion toward ALL who she encounters is the embodiment of our wish to make everyone feel welcome at Family House. 

Her professional achievements from HR to finance and management all things related to our business office have only increased over the past 20 years, and we look forward to the next 20 years of her leadership and guidance in many ways. Jessica, thank you for your stellar work (it hasn’t been easy!), and for making us all better people by your example of calm, warm, and professional demeanor.  You mean so much to everyone at Family House that we couldn’t be successful without your experience and expertise. On behalf of the Board of Directors, the families, volunteers and especially the staff, we mark this anniversary with gratitude and joy for our amazingly wonderful colleague.

Volunteer Spotlight: Anne Finigan

We love Anne Finigan! She's been volunteering at Family House since the early days in 1981!

Co-Founder Dr. Art Ablin: Happy 90th Birthday!

Happy Birthday to Family House co-founder Dr. Arthur Ablin! As a leader in the field of Pediatric Oncology, Dr. Ablin has been treating young patients since the 1950’s. We celebrate his legacy and thank him for his vision of creating a sanctuary that is free to all families during their child’s treatment. Dr. Ablin’s compassion, focus on our mission, and unwavering dedication to Family House for the past 35 years has produced a model of community that we celebrate this day and every day of the year – from all of us and the over 35,000 families that have stayed at Family House, Art, thank you for your remarkable leadership.

Goodbye Inner Sunset, Hello Mission Bay!

 Bittersweet goodbye! We've said goodbye to the original Family House locations in the Inner Sunset as we move to our brand new Nancy and Stephen Grand Family House in Mission Bay. The new building is going to be such a wonderful improvement for our families, but we've heard from plenty of people that our original buildings will always feel like a "home away from home" in San Francisco. We hope that the new building will feel that way very quickly, too, and we feel good that all of the lovely touches to make the new building a comfortable space will indeed be great for our families.

Ann's Story - The Early Years of Family House

Family House Family Stories: Sharing the brave and inspiring stories of families of children with cancer and other life-threatening illnesses. This story features Ann Adamson Leonardo, mother to John Leonardo, who was treated by Dr. Art Ablin at the UCSF Children's Hospital in San Francisco. Inspired by what she saw during the time of her son's treatment, Ann and her husband, joined Art and Debbie Ablin, and others, to help found Family House.

Opening New Doors of Compassion

Watch our latest video: Opening New Doors of Compassion

Family House Family Stories: Sarah's Story

Watch the latest Family House Family Stories Video: Sarah’s Story, and learn how you can help cancer fighters like Sarah: http://www.familyhouseinc.org/donate.html

Volunteer Appreciation Week

We have the greatest people surrounding us! Volunteers from all over the world find a small local charity in San Francisco called Family House where they make the choice to help. The entire existence of Family House could not have happened if it wasn't for volunteers.  

Family House started with an all-volunteer staff.  From the very beginning, it was volunteers that chose to come together to create a place where families would be taken care of. As the need to support more families started to grow, volunteers have been there every step of the way.

By providing meals, dogs to pet, yoga to relax, arts to create, a haircut to feel good, and maintaining the facilitates, volunteers have provided comfort and care to the families who stay with us. "It's as good as home." During the hardest time of their lives, volunteers make the experience at Family House so much better.

We send a big Thank You to over 1,700 volunteers who walk through our doors every year. As Family House moves to Mission Bay, our need for more dedicated, compassionate, quality volunteers will continue to grow. We are thrilled to be able to provide new opportunities for even more volunteers to get involved.

To all of our volunteers, thank you for making the choice to help provide families with community, comfort, and support to make them feel at home during their trying times.

To learn more about volunteering at Family House, visit http://www.familyhouseinc.org/volunteer.html

Volunteer Profile in Family Focus

Check out this December 1983 article about volunteering in the original Family House newsletter, Family Focus!

#ThrowbackThursday

Getting Your Priorities Straight by Cory Farley

This powerful article first appeared in the December 1983 issue of Family Focus, the Family House newsletter, and it's still relevant today.

    Let the lawn go unmowed. Put the sprinkler on the tomatoes instead of watering them by hand, or leave them to wither. Let that last bit of work wait until Monday, and get home on time tonight. There are things that are important and things that aren't, and it's time you figured out the difference.
    This burst of philosophy, sappy as it may sound coming out of the blue like this, has been painfully learned: I've spent much of the last three weeks prowling the pediatric ward at Moffitt Hospital in San Francisco, and I've come home with an awareness of mortality I didn't have even in Vietnam.
    I was there- this is only to forestall speculation, not to beat my breast in public- because my wife and I learned early this month that our 2-year old son has leukemia. Just a few years ago, that was a death sentence. Now the five-year survival rate is about 70 percent, and many of those cases are presumed cured. Matt's getting good treatment, and we're optimistic he'll do well.
    But the things I've seen since June 2 have changed the way I will live the rest of my life.
    I wish no one else ever had to endure a month like this, or the years of treatment we pray are still to come. But the fact is that your chances are the same as ours were- 1 in 23,000 for leukemia; higher or lower for other catastrophes. And if I can pass along what I've learned, it may help those who have to face these tragedies- as well as those who don't.
    On balance, I think I'm about as good a father as I can be. Like everybody else, I sometimes cut the grass when my son wants to go fishing or watch football when he wants to play it. But I've also skipped parties to take him on picnics and gone to work at 6 in the morning so I could play with him in the evenings instead of working late.
    And we've been lucky, in a way. We've met parents this month who won't get a second chance. Kids get brain tumors, they get aplastic anemia, they're run over by cars and burned in fires and they go for rides with nice strangers. To some of their parents, a 70 percent chance of survival looks like immortality.
    Here's something to think about. Of all those people, not one expected ever to be pacing the halls of Moffitt Hospital, not any more than I did; no more than you do.
    Four weeks ago I thought- as you probably do- that the most serious "disaster" we'd face would be mumps, or maybe a broken leg. Leukemia was what happened to those kids you read about occasionally who get a trip to Disneyland courtesy of some local service club. But families like yours and mine- careful with prenatal nutrition, adamant about proper diet (Matt had never had a soft drink until we had to force fluids in the hospital), safety-conscious- bad things don't happen to us.
    Wrong: They do. Not just cancer, but all kinds of tragedies. And not just to kids, but to adults as well. My chance of being killed in a car crash, which I never even think about, is statistically five times greater than Matt's was of developing leukemia. You probably don't worry much about accidents at home, but there are twice as many fatalities in the home each year as there are new cases of leukemia.
    The point of this is not to scare you, but to urge you to look at your life. If you knew you had a 30 percent chance of dying in the next five years, or that one of your kids did, would you do all the niggling things you should do, or the things you want to do? Would you cut the lawn this weekend, or go to the park and fly a kite? Paint the bathroom or take a picnic lunch to Lake Tahoe?
    But, you say, we're all healthy, and the house is a mess.
    Why should that make a difference? In 20 years, your kids aren't going to remember if the kitchen floor was shiny. But they'll remember you had time to push them on the swings.

Staff Spotlight: Paul Goold

Interview with Paul Goold, Director of Operations

How did you come to be at Family House?

My wife, Megan, was the Resident Manager here at Family House and that was in September of 1997 or 1998. Then in 2001 I became a Weekend Manager. And in 2002 I became the Resident Manager.

How has Family House changed since you first started?

When I first started, Megan and I were living in the manager’s unit at the 50 Irving Street house – we had only 10 bedrooms available for families, and at the time, this was the only building Family House had to work with. It was light and lean; a wonderful small nonprofit serving families primarily in the oncology department. We had three rooms for patients receiving chemotherapy, three rooms for bone marrow transplant patients, and three rooms for radiation patients. There was an unfortunate limitation of families served due to our limited resources. Then in 2002, when we opened the new house on 10^th and Irving, we were able to help house the entire out-of-town pediatric oncology patient population. We went from ten rooms to thirty-four rooms, and that was very exciting!  

What are some of your favorite Family House memories?

Definitely giving guitar lessons to kids, singing songs with the kids, and Christmases are definitely a highlight. I will always remember being Santa Claus on Christmas Eve - putting presents outside families’ doors and giving them just a little jolt of good Christmas cheer while they are all so far away from home. Nothing is as satisfying as being able to give these families a little bit of happiness while they are going through such a difficult time in life.

Learn more about the caring staff at Family House:  http://www.familyhouseinc.org/staff.html

Dr. Arthur Ablin, Family House Founder

As Memorial Day has just passed, it's a good opportunity for us to reflect and say Thank You to all who have made Family House possible for the last 33 years, and to those who are ensuring our future at Mission Bay.

In the words of our founder, Dr. Arthur Ablin, “The greatest thing in the world is to be able to do something for somebody else.” Watch the new video:

We are at the mid-point of the Calling All Angels campaign (http://www.indiegogo.com/projects/calling-all-angels) right now, and we ask that each of you tell 10 new friends about the campaign. If we could get them to each donate just $40, we will exceed our goal! Your generosity is something to be proud of, and together, we will build the new Nancy and Stephen Grand Family House!



Thank you for all you do for our families!

Staff Spotlight: Amy Lenz

Interview with Amy Lenz, Development Associate

How did you come to be at Family House?
When I was at San Francisco State, in the Fall semester of 2005, I took a Community Involvement Course, where you get credit for volunteering. SF State had a whole wall of brochures of different places in the city to volunteer and get involved… I had worked at other nonprofits that raised money for cancer research and support, and since I love kids, Family House was a really good fit, where those things are all combined.

I was at Family House weekly throughout that semester, and I then became a Weekend Manager in 2006.  I worked in the hospitality industry for several years before joining Family House full time as the Volunteer Coordinator in 2009. Also in 2009, I helped start the Family House Young Professionals Advisory Council (YPAC), and was the first Chairperson - our first fundraiser was at Tonic in the Russian Hill neighborhood.

How has Family House changed since you first started?
We’ve hired more people since I’ve been here, so there’s more staff, which is good, because the organization as a whole has really grown as far as the amount of work there is.  We do a lot more outreach, a lot more events - specifically with the work that YPAC has done.  I think we’ve grown as a “brand” in San Francisco, and we’ve built a really strong community for our families and our volunteers through social media. 

When I first got here, we weren’t actively doing social media. We had a Facebook page, and every time we had a volunteer group, we’d put their photos on Facebook, and put that link in the “thank you” email. We still do that today,  but we have a marketing plan now!

And that doesn’t even consider everything that’s happening with Mission Bay. When I got here, the focus was on doing what we do really well, and continuing to get better with that; and now we’re actually looking to expand and scale what we do to a level that will help even more people.

What are some of your favorite Family House memories?
There’s a couple who stayed here, Hank and Ashley Stull, from Central CA - they really influenced me. Their baby, Lorenzo, didn’t develop a diaphragm, and everything in his chest cavity merged together and he ended up passing away.  It’s so sad, but that family, Hank and Ashley, were the sweetest couple, and Hank’s passion was food.  They stayed here for a week after Lorenzo passed, and since Hank was a chef, he ended up cooking a meal for the 10th Avenue staff - me, Greg, Jon, and Joe. They were just the most beautiful, positive people, and they made us this dinner, and they were so thankful… They came back for an anniversary of Lorenzo’s passing, and they had since gotten married and shared photos of their life with us…

It’s a great example of how even when things don’t turn out the way you want them to, there’s still a light. It was still a beautiful experience despite the tragedy.  And they were able to use the baby’s organs to save another child, they used his heart to save another baby. 

Each of the staff here connect differently to different families, and anytime I’ve really had a chance to connect with anyone - the kid or the parents (usually the parents, for me) - it really makes a strong, positive impact on me, and you get a sense of how what we do really helps.

Their story was one of the first posts on our blog: http://www.familyhouseinc.blogspot.com/2011/07/food-filled-with-love.html

A Cancer Survivor Looks Back

What would you do if you found out your 5-year-old had cancer?

In February of 2000, Matt and Mary Ferrick noticed their son was limping, and they did what any parent would do - they brought him to the doctor. Scans revealed that a previously-undetected tumor in his stomach had now spread to his hip. Jay was rushed 100 miles from their home in Ukiah to UCSF to be treated for stage 4 neuroblastoma. Pulled out of kindergarten, he was admitted to the hospital, and his family stayed at Family House on and off for 14 months while he underwent chemotherapy, radiation, surgery, and a stem cell transplant.

"One thing I remember about the Family House is that I always looked forward to going.  Especially I remember because there were video games in the downstairs living room, and me and my little brother looked forward to playing video games because we didn't have them at home," recalls Jay, now 19 years old and a healthy sophomore at Chico State.

"Jay is doing very well, he lives a normal life, and is able to do everything that everybody else does.  He's been 12-13 years in remission now.  Of the type of cancer he had, 70% of the kids relapse, but Jay has been healthy since he completed his treatment. It's been a blessing to put it in the rear view mirror," says his father, Matt.

"Family House provided support for the whole family…  [For Jay's younger brother, Thomas,] having a sibling who's getting all the attention - some people really struggle with that, feeling they're in the background…. we've always tried to make them feel equal." Playing Nintendo in the Family House living room was a highlight for both boys. "[Thomas] thought it was a big thrill to go to San Francisco and see his big brother;" at only 3 years old at the time, he couldn't comprehend the seriousness of the situation, Matt recalls.

Jay's oncologist, Dr. Katherine Matthay, says that "Neuroblastoma is a very, very serious cancer that we find only in young children. More than 50% of children already have the cancer spread to their bones and their bone marrow at the time the cancer is detected." At the time of Jay's diagnosis and treatment, fewer than 15% of children survived metastatic neuroblastoma.

Dick and Anne Grace of Grace Family Vineyards are longtime Family House supporters, and have even awarded a grant to Dr. Matthay for cancer research. The targeted radiotherapy treatment that was developed from that grant is now one of the most active treatments for widespread and resistant neuroblastoma.  Dick says, "Annie and I had the extraordinary privilege of walking a portion of Jay's cure path alongside both he and his family, and it was there that we got the opportunity to see the courage and see the commitment and the resolve that he had in navigating this path."

Looking back, Jay hopes that his battle with cancer will be an inspiration to others who are currently undergoing treatment. "When we go to UCSF, we visit '7 Long,' the floor I was on, and I see all the kids there, and I hope that they see how I am, and hope that they can be cured and be a regular kid like me."

We are delighted that the Ferricks continue to be part of the Family House family!

Follow us on Facebook to see the latest on some of our amazing families:  http://facebook.com/FamilyHouseSanFrancisco

Click here to learn more about Family House families:
http://www.familyhouseinc.org/family-stories.html

Sign up for our newsletters to stay in the loop on all Family House news: http://www.familyhouseinc.org/newsletter.shtml#newsletterform

Family House Staff Spotlight: Jessica Creager

Interview with Jessica Creager, Director of Finance and Special Events

How did you come to be at Family House?
When I first started at Family House in November 1997, as Assistant Administrator, there were only three full-time staff members. I heard about the position through the then-Executive Director, Cliff Berg, who was looking for someone who knew how to do Quickbooks, and I had that experience. I never knew about Family House before I was offered the job, but I've grown to love it!

How has Family House Changed since you first started?
When I first started, we housed 10 families a night, and now we house 34 families a night.  We had only one building; now we have two.  The annual budget has increased from $350,000 to $1.6 million. We were only three staffers, and there's eleven of us now.

What are some of your favorite Family House memories?
The Giants stadium AT&T Ballpark event! We got to celebrate Family House's 30th Anniversary with families from so many different years. It was great to see so many families that I've gotten to know while working at Family House, and to see the continuity.

Also, getting to know Nayiri Torigian, who was a young woman who battled cancer. She and her family, they were just so sweet.  She sadly passed away, but getting to know that family was really important, especially important for me, for when I later went through cancer treatment.  She was inspiring to me.

Working at Family house before my cancer diagnosis gave me so much insight to what was coming. Knowing all the kids and all the families that I'd met actually made me more brave in the face of dealing with the treatments. Treatment wasn't as scary to me because I had known personally, especially little ones, who had faced it with no problems.  So, I figured I couldn't be a total wimp about the whole thing!  [Laughs.]  The great acceptance I felt, having a personal illness, and coming back and being greeted with open arms…  not ostracized, not something strange, since at Family House, it's the norm. I've been cancer-free since 2002, and am now officially cured!

Another great thing about being at Family House has been getting to know Family House founders, The Ablins.  They've been so welcoming to me, kind of treating me like family through all these years.  It's been an honor to get to know them and hear their stories, and how they started Family House, but also how they've done so many other amazing things throughout their lives.

Learn more about the caring staff at Family House:  http://www.familyhouseinc.org/staff.html 

Founder to Founder, by Arthur Ablin, M.D., December 2012

Sit down with me for a few minutes and become moved as I have by this touching yet uplifting story about one of our Family House’s remarkable and resilient patients and his loving, supportive family.

Austin Young, now 18 years old was stricken (yes, that’s the word) at 6 months of age with a cancer of the retinas of both his eyes. The stage of his cancer, a retinoblastoma, was such that without treatment he would certainly have rapidly become blind and died as a young child. Infant Austin and his family were presented with devastating alternative choices for treatment: One was the immediate removal of both eyes with instant blindness; The other option available was radiation therapy to both of his infant eyes with only a hope, not a promise, that his life could be saved with a slight possibility that some modicum of vision might be retained. The price for this latter choice would be cataracts in both eyes with obvious facial changes as the rest of his face and head grew. If that were not overwhelming by itself, survivors of retinblastoma of both eyes have a high life-long chance of developing other cancers later increased by the very radiation therapy used to treat the original retinoblastoma. Those second cancers are difficult to treat and may or may not be curable.

Imagine with me the stresses associated with decision making this family was going through. No good choices, only bad or worse ones. How can anyone be asked to make them? It doesn’t seem fair to ask any parent to make these decisions for their child. Exacting daily radiation therapy in the UCSF Department of Radiation Oncology for several weeks requiring motionless eyes and therefore, daily anesthesia for several weeks was their least horrendous treatment choice. The family stayed at Family House during these many weeks of radiation and the monthly follow up visits for many years. During that time and the innumerable check-up examinations required, Austin, his parents and sister, Bonnie, David, and Lauren called Family House home. They survived and Austin adjusted, even excelled with remarkable strength of character in spite of his impaired vision and physical disability.

Now 18 years later, 6 foot delightful Austin is blind in his left eye and has 20/200 vision in his right eye (sees at 20 feet what a person with normal vision can see at 200 feet). He has under growth of the mid portion of his face making him easily distinguishable among his peers, an appearance with which he has become comfortable because of his engaging, pleasant smile, a twinkle in his poorly sighted eyes and his quiet demeanor. If that were not enough, more of the medical story continues. At age 16, 2 years ago, cured from his retinoblastoma, a popular, productive and bright sophomore in Bella Vista high school dealing successfully with his visual and physical disabilities, Austin and his family discovered a rapidly growing lump in his left upper neck. Austin had developed a different, second cancer at the left side of his face. It required a meticulous 16 hour operation, then months of chemotherapy with further radiation therapy. Long stays in at UCSF and at Family House were then again required with the hope this second cancer had been cured. Unfortunately, less than a year later there is a recurrence of his rhabdomyosarcoma. Austin and his family are guests again at Family House while he is receiving yet another course of alternative chemotherapy and cyber knife radiation surgery. Austin and his family know the outcome of this treatment is questionable but face this with realistic optimism, humor and characteristic determination.

In spite of missing many days and weeks of school Austin managed to keep up with his class work, and recently graduated from high school and has been accepted to start U.C. Davis. High intensive chemotherapy and radiation therapy require that he defers Davis now. Austin recognizes the important role Family House has been for him and his family, both in the support with other families over the years and the high cost that would have resulted in finding accommodations in San Francisco. To express appreciation to Family House for all that he and his family received, Austin, whose goal in life is to become a computer engineer, created a social event called “Gaming 4 a Cause” to support Family House. He elicited support from classmates and with his and their parents established a non-profit charity of which he is the president. His 17 and 18 year old classmates are the vice-president, financial officer, treasurer and publicity director, and secretary. This team has acquired the necessary hardware through contributions and careful purchasing , arranged rent-free space at Fuddrucker’s World’s Greatest Hamburger restaurant outside of Sacramento where they hold week-end events charging small entrance fees. Participants form teams which compete to win electronic prizes such as controllers, mice and software. During the past several months attendance has steadily grown and the profits for an evening of spirited fun and clean sociability have been as high as $1600. The restaurant is glad to have them! As the popularity increases and all the details of his enterprise are further fine-tuned, Austin and his sister Lauren are spreading the word and know how of Gaming 4 a Cause to other schools hoping to multiply the profits for Family House. A quiet smile creeps over his face, his poorly sighted eyes twinkle and he softly says “It’s for Family House.” Go Austin! Go Youngs! Go Family House! We are here for each other and all other thousands of children and their families that are called Family House.

July 2013 UPDATE: Austin has finished chemotherapy and radiation, and is headed to UC Davis this fall.  Keep an eye on Gaming 4 a Cause happenings at www.gaming4acause.org

Click here to learn more about Family House families:
http://www.familyhouseinc.org/family-stories.html 

Family House: Over Three Decades of Serving Young Patient Families

by Gail Berkley
Sun-Reporter Volume 67 Number 16, Thursday April 18, 2013

Imagine if you have a seriously ill child who is hospitalized miles away from home. As a parent, you would want to spend almost every moment possible at the child's bedside and commuting to and from the hospital daily would only add to your stress. For over 30 years Family House in San Francisco has fulfilled a vital need for parents facing such challenges.

Family House provides a caring home away from home for parents of seriously ill children who are patients at University of California San Francisco Benioff Children's hospital.

As UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital prepares to move to a new location in the city's Mission Bay area, Family House also plans to relocate to serve families in brand new facilities.

In order to make the move, Family House must acquire land and construct a new building in the vicinity of the hospital. Plans are under way to ensure that families will receive the same care, comfort, and compassionate housing completely free of charge while their child receives care at the new hospital. The agency hopes to open the new facility by 2016.

"We are grateful to Mayor Lee and City Administrator Naomi Kelly for their strong support of our move to Mission Bay," said Executive Director Alexandra Morgan. "Their ongoing support, along with their staff, has been critical to helping us relocate with the new children's hospital and continue serving the most vulnerable members of the Bay Area community."

Founded in 1981, Family House provides temporary housing free of charge at two locations to the young patients' families. To qualify for the housing families must live more than 50 miles from UCSF. Families are referred by pediatric social workers and many of them live at or below the low-income status as determined by UCSF.

With a $1.5 million annual budget, the non-profit organization serves an average of 34 families per night. The two current locations sustain a nearly 100% occupancy rate and can accommodate 107 people per night. Over the course of a year more than 2,000 families are served, according to agency statistics.

Working in conjunction with UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital, the agency strives to provide family-centered care for patient families.

One family that has made repeat visits to Family House is that of a young girl named Sharita. Now 9, Sharita has had a kidney transplant. Her aunt and guardian, Suprena Dickson of Clovis, first stayed at Family House in September, 2011 for about 2 months. After that, she has come to Family House for short visits a few times a year.

The families of children undergoing bone marrow transplants, chemotherapy, and radiation are the agency's most common guests. Family House also accommodates those facing other life-threatening childhood illnesses such as fetal surgery, transplants, and cardiac patients when space is available.

For more information on Family House log onto www.familyhouseinc.org.