Photo: Eva Johnston will be running to raise funds for cancer research at the Terry Fox Run this Sunday. You can join her or help her raise funds at the link at the bottom of this story. In this photo, she is speaking to one of the ladies who helped raise the Terry Fox flag in front of the Algonquin Theatre on Monday, September 12, kicking off Terry Fox week and the run this Sunday. (Huntsville Doppler photo).
Terry Fox once showed a nation that despite unimaginable hardships, one’s determination, positive outlook, and fighting spirit can be kept alive. There are those who continue to reflect that strength to this day and one shining example is Huntsville native and cancer survivor, Eva Johnston, who will be participating in the annual Huntsville Terry Fox run this Sunday.
“She is a little firecracker, she has got so much energy,” Eva’s mother, Jenn Johnston says. “You tell her she can’t do something and she’ll do it twice as fast just to prove you wrong. She’s very stubborn and very determined. I remember saying to my mom ‘this kid is gonna drive me nuts.’ And then she got sick. And that little fighting spirit, you still saw. She didn’t let it stop her from being a kid in a lot of ways. And I thought ‘this is why you were blessed with this determination,’ because that is what kept her going through everything.”
Eva was diagnosed with leukemia on February 17, 2016, at the age of three, and finished treatment on April 30, 2018. She is now nine years old, healthy, and thriving.
Though Eva has been in remission since 2018, she is still regularly monitored, as there exists the possibility of secondary cancers and long-term side effects from the treatments, which are greater among children than adults.
“It’s not over when the treatment ends; it’s a lifetime worry,” Johnston says. “But at this stage, we are so blessed. She is healthy and she still has that fighting spirit and now I’m back to ‘this kid’s gonna drive me crazy.’”
Eva has been participating in the school Terry Fox events since her Junior Kindergarten year, and this year marks her second Terry Fox run for the town of Huntsville. Eva’s online fundraising page has surpassed her $2,750 goal.
Johnston emphasizes that the Terry Fox Run is an extremely important event for her family and she has always encouraged her children to participate. Last year, Eva expressed interest in participating in the Huntsville Terry Fox Run, so Johnston contacted Sharon Stahls, the organizer for the Huntsville event. Through speaking to Eva, Stahls discovered that she was a cancer survivor. Stahls invited Eva to the preliminary flag raising, in order to honour her battle and raise awareness for the reality of childhood cancer.
“It helped to generate more buzz about what’s going on,” Johnston says. “All of a sudden, you have a face to cancer, it’s not just a hypothetical, it’s someone’s child.”
After hearing of Eva’s story, the Terry Fox Foundation contacted the Johnston family and asked if Eva—along with Fred Fox, Terry Fox’s brother—would appear as a guest speaker on their annual Zoom call to thank all of the event organizers across Canada. Despite some nervousness, Eva eagerly agreed and her appearance on the call was welcomely received. A month later, the foundation asked Eva to be the school ambassador for 2022, a position fulfilled by a different child affected by cancer each year. She became the poster girl for the Terry Fox Foundation and her face now appears on posters and pledge forms for the Terry Fox run in 9000 schools across the country.
“I think that what’s really important and amazing about the Terry Fox Foundation is that a large portion of the money does go towards researching the more popular types of cancers but they also support those harder to treat cancers,” Johnston says. “They’re investing time and energy and money into that so that everyone has a fighting chance. We need to find kinder, gentler treatments for not just children, but for everybody.”
Johnston emphasizes the importance of normalizing the topic of cancer and creating open conversation so that it can become an approachable reality instead of a scary taboo. This is especially important since the disease can affect anyone from any walk of life, and sends ripple effects that in turn, affect family, friends, and everyone else around them.
“These organizations are so important because it’s not just my child, it could be anybody’s child. It literally can happen to anyone at any time,” Johnston says. “I think people are scared of the cancer word, to be honest, once you’re in that world, it rolls off your tongue, just as any other word would but I definitely think most people associate cancer with death, so we need to normalize it and have conversations about it.”
Johnston further emphasizes that these crucial conversations surrounding cancer need to begin with our youth, and they need to be encouraged to get involved, as they often have more potential than they are able to realize.
“We want Terry’s legacy to go on for the next hundreds of years, and if we don’t educate our youth, who’s going to carry it on?” Johnston questions. “Eva has said to me that she’s finally doing something about it because, for two and a half years of treatment, she had no control over anything. And now she feels like she’s doing something. I think that when we’re educating all these kids, we’re showing them that they’re taking control over something, and not just kids who have had cancer, but any of them. It shows them ‘you’re little, but you can make such a difference.’”
This year’s annual Terry Fox run will take place this Sunday, September 18 at Huntsville High School. Registration begins at 8 am, and the run at 9 am.
To donate, find Eva Johston’s fundraising page here: https://run.terryfox.ca/3447/page/35880
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