SMILE TO LIFE
Smile to life
It is an association that accompanies children with cancer throughout the disease through an intra and extra hospital program. She intervenes throughout the year at the Timone hospital (Marseilles). A sports hall is made available to the teams of the association in order to offer children with cancer individual support, close to high-level athletes. If their physical condition allows it, it offers them the opportunity to participate in internships organized around sports, artistic projects and trips to an innovative place of care and rehabilitation in L'Estaque: the “Lighthouse of Smiles”, 1st center in Europe.
The association welcomes up to 150 children on Wednesdays and offers them full board stays: Wednesdays, weekends and during school holidays.
The children come there to carry out various projects which aim to reconcile them with their body and invite them to surpass themselves. These adventures allow them to restore a certain balance with the difficult tests that they cross and live a real child's life despite the constraints of the treatments that punctuate their daily lives:
- From the Hospital to the Big Blue: crossing by catamaran from Marseille to Corsica
- Dog sledding expedition in the Canadian Far North and Lapland
- Show combining song, theater and dance on tour throughout France
- Winter ski holidays
At the hospital as at the Lighthouse of Smiles, a complete program thus combines relaxation, mental imagery, physical preparation, sleep, osteopathy and nutritional monitoring, to allow children to have access to the maximum resources when they need them the most. With this program, they stay in better physical and psychological shape, lose less weight, maintain better autonomy. They learn to manage their anxieties and regain confidence.
An accompaniment, projects and a surpassing of oneself….
Smile at Life is a big family composed of professionals from the Timone hospital (nurses and doctors) and teachers in adapted physical activities. The members of the association know precisely the experience of each child to guarantee a personalized welcome and a duration of care until the end of the illness.
At the Lighthouse of Smiles, away from the hospital setting, the children find each other and confide in their own words….All the courses focus on physical activity with projects, sporting challenges (Crossing the Mediterranean by catamaran every summer, expedition to Lapland, etc.) The children come back from these trips transformed because they realize that they are still able to do many things with their body despite the illness. This is the ambition that drives the association: define aims to children and through sport, transcendence.
Children have the opportunity to meet top athletes such as Camille Lacourt, who encourage them by setting challenges and helping them discover training techniques to exceed their abilities. A doctoral student is also present on site to finalize a 3-year study on thethe benefits of sport on children, the results of which will make it possible to scientifically measure the beneficial effects of these activities about the disease, effects noted by the team of the association, but also the doctors present during the activities.
Pepahart and Smile to Life
By creating Pepahart, it seemed obvious and natural to us to support an association linked to children. We chose Smile to Life for very simple reasons. The children of Sourire à la Vie can recharge their batteries in a peaceful and benevolent center where they can talk about the disease and continue their life as a child without being in a hospital environment. Thanks to the many projects carried out by the association, the children set themselves goals like high-level athletes. The Lighthouse of Smiles, located in l'Estaque near Marseille, designed and produced by Frédéric Sotteau, is a unique place in Europe for children with cancer. This place reflects community spirit, envy and calm where children can recharge their batteries.
Everything has been thought out so that this center does not look like a medical center :
“We enter by a footbridge like on a boat, the light floods the living room thanks to the huge bay windows facing the sea. In the treatment room, the wishing tree takes place in the middle of a refined decor. Not far away, out of sight, a zen place for the well-being of children. The cozy dormitories remind us of the atmosphere of summer camps with natural wooden beds where it is good to fall asleep. We would forget the illness… And that is certainly Frédéric's objective, a place to recharge his batteries.
At the Lighthouse of Smiles, if the moments of relaxation are appreciated, the sports training is all the more. It's in the basement that everything happens, a huge gym and a music room are available to children...We also train at the Lighthouse of Smiles to strengthen ourselves physically and mentally”….
Sport being an engine of energy at Pepahart and the Phare des Sourires, it is only natural that we bring our drop of water to help these children in their life projects. Despite advances in medical treatments, each year more and more children around the world are affected by cancer. They need you to finance their projects... And, why not contribute to the development of the Sourire à la Vie program in other regions of France. Sick children would also benefit from a program to recharge their batteries and be able to discuss their illness with other children.
Let's take care of life, childhood and dreams together.
Make a donation to Smile for Life
Making a donation to Sourire à la Vie is allowing sick children to have life projects outside of a hospital bed. It is a personal and voluntary process. Thus, in your basket, you will find a small checkbox to donate to the association. All funds raised through our platform will be donated annually to "Smile to life" and you will be informed via our Facebook page of the donations collected.
It's not much for you, but it's a lot for them.
The children are counting on you!
