What is HUGS?

HUGS is a local, non-profit organization that stands for help, understanding, and group support. HUGS' mission statement is, “providing support, compassion and aloha to keep families with seriously ill children together.” They, “accept [their] families exactly where they are...at their present emotional, physical or spiritual level.” The only membership requirement is that the family has a child with a life threatening illness. HUGS provides all services and programs free of charge to their families. The founders of HUGS recognized that families with seriously ill children have to deal with many more challenges than normal families, and this puts the whole population at risk. These families have high divorce rates and are burdened with the stress of financial, spiritual, and emotional issues that come with their child's sickness. The illness of the child not only affects themselves, but their other family members as well. For this reason, HUGS has aimed to create holistic programs that support all members of the family. Most of the children survive through their illnesses and stay with the organization past their recovery until they are ready to move on. HUGS is not a typical support group. It is a place of joy where families can come for peer-to-peer support, fun and family orientated activities.

Family Events
HUGS offers many programs to its families. The family events include dinners, holiday parties, Celebration of Life, and recreational outings. All events come at no cost to the families and are adjusted to accommodate all families and their specific needs. They are created for families to have fun, relax, meet other families in similar situations, spend quality time together, and make new friends.

The dinners are held once a month at the HUGS house and include food and informal entertainment. The parents get a time to relax and the child get time to have fun with other kids. Occasionally, the dinners are held elsewhere such as the Waikiki Aquarium, Punahou School, and the Honolulu Zoo.

Celebration of Life is held annually to commemorate the HUGS children who have passed away in the past year. There is a remembrance ceremony to reflect on the children who have passed on. The environment is very supportive at this event. After the ceremony beings the celebration of life. Families share their old stories and begin to make new ones.

The Holiday Parties are fun for the kids and time for the adults to mingle. During the holidays, families with seriously ill child normally have additional stress induced by many possible issues: time, money, ill child, siblings, coping with a loss, and/or the feeling that they are supposed to be happy. HUGS tries to make the holidays a time of joy for these families by holding these parties for their members.

Peer Groups
HUGS believes in peer-to-peer support. The organization brings families together who are facing similar situations so that they can see that they are not the only ones dealing with rough issues. Together, through events provided free of charge by HUGS, families can expand their support network and meet other people who they can relate to and vice versa. The peer group activities are aimed to bring families together and prevent them from feelings of isolation. Mom's night occurs once a month. It is a time where mothers from all over can gather for a time of relaxation and bonding, and provide support to each other. Dad's night also occurs monthly. Both the HUGS moms and dads enjoy this time to themselves, separated from the stress of having a seriously ill child that seems to consume them 24/7. Activities they engage in include scrap booking, facials, movies, dinners, and plays for the mothers, and massages, dinners, and movies for the dads. HUGS also manages a Teen group for peer support among the sick adolescents who are dealing with more stresses than average kids of their age. Activities that they have participated in during the past include submarine rides, bowling, laser tag, lunches, and movies.

Respites
Respites occur twice a month at the HUGS house, for blocks of four hours on Friday nights. These respites benefit both the children and the parents or guardians. The children's guardians leave their children in the trusted care of HUGS volunteers at the HUGS house in Kaimuki for the night. During this time, they are able to take care of any personal business that they normally have no time to focus on. These respites provides short periods of rest for the parents. The children left to play at the house get special one on one attention from the volunteers who engage all the children, sick or siblings of the sick, in an activity, whether it be playing outside on the swing set or play structure, or a game of Wii or Trouble in the house. When it gets dark, all children and volunteers are called inside for dinner.

HUGS also provides an emergency respite service to the families at the house, Monday through Friday during the work hours, provided that a HUGS staff member is present. The families do not tend to use this service often but in times of emergency it is a really valuable resource to them.

Laughter Wagon
The Laughter Wagon Program, the one I have been assigned to for the community service portion of my class, is run at Kapiolani Medical Center and Kaiser Moanalua Medical Center for HUGS children in the pediatric ward. Trained volunteers visit the inpatients with their backpack of toys, and engage them and their siblings in play and activities. The purpose of this program is to reduce their stress and anxiety built up from being hospitalized for so long. The parents are also provided with a brief break to leave the room and get some fresh air or take care of any personal needs, if necessary.

Silver Lining
The HUGS Silver Lining Toy Chest programs is run at Kapiolani Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente Moanalua, and Tripler Army Medical Center. The chests are stocked with small toys and movie tickets. After a HUGS child has gone through a painful medical procedure, they have the joy of picking out a new toy from the toy chest. These toys offer a distraction from the pain after a recent procedure, and are also something for the children to look forward to after their treatments if they are aware of them.

Financial
HUGS has a couple of major funds to help out their families during times of financial need. One of them is The Maldondo Airfare Fund, established in 1996. It provides emergency airfare assistance to families in a medical crisis. It pays for the parents to travel with their child traveling for a treatment. HUGS believes that it is important to keep families together during times of medical crisis for support. The airfare fund is capped at $2000 per family per year because of financial necessity.

When HUGS expanded its neighbor island outreach program, the demand for on the HUGS airfare fund increased. Thus came of the Neighbor Island Outreach Fund. The demographics of HUGS families fluctuates, so some years the airfare fund is highly used by active duty military, and others it is more used by civilians.

In 1985, the HUGS Kokua Kupboard food box program was founded. This program supplements families with food products periodically and in emergency based on need. HUGS receives donations from the Hawaii Foodbank and community organizations. The costs of care of sick children are very expensive and use up many families incomes. Their financial problems lead to stress and anxiety. HUGS tries to assist these struggling families by at least ensuring that they have food on the table.

HUGS is partnered with the Hawaii Sand Play Council, and for this reason HUGS Sand Play Therapy is a program available to the HUGS children free of cost. The children have the opportunity to express themselves non-verbally in a therapeutic setting. Children with illnesses and undergoing treatment can have a lot of resentment, fear, anxiety, sadness, and loneliness with no outlet. With the help of trained therapists they can work out their feelings. Financial support for this program is provided from the the Jack and Chonita Larsen Fund.

The HUGS Funeral Expense Fund is for those families who after years of financial and emotional struggles, lose their child and have no way to pay for the funeral expenses. It was created in the year 2000, and is capped at $1000 per family.

Volunteers
HUGS has more than 90 volunteers who help to support the HUGS children, but they are always looking for new ones. Volunteers may participate in respites, family dinners, the Laughter Wagon program, office support, special events and recreational outings.

Donations
Money donations can be made online or by mail. HUGS also takes car, clothing, canned foods, toys, and household items donations. If interested one should contact the HUGS house prior to any collections or drop offs.

Citation:
"HUGS." HUGS, Help, Understanding & Group Support. 12 July 2009 <http://www.hugslove.org/index.php>.