Educating Our Kids Living With Sickle Cell

New children's book coming

I am proud to announce that my newest children's book will be published in the summer of 2023. It will be a special book that I wrote together with my princess and my good friend who is a pediatrician. The 3 of us have been busy over the past year working out all the ideas, having illustrations made, and completing the story.

Writing a children's book is always a wonderful experience. Three years ago, I published my first children's book, 'Keemaya and the Beach, My Journey Living With Sickle Cell' which has since been translated into 4 languages: English, Dutch, French, and Spanish.'Keemaya and the Beach' explains in a very fun and playful way to both children and adults what sickle cell disease (SCD) is, the rules that are important, and how to deal with SCD when you go swimming.

We do this for our children

The responses I have received worldwide have motivated me to write another book in which I will provide tools to our families. In the new children's book I will mainly explain why it is important to faithfully go to the doctor, do the different tests, and in an interactive way I will help the children to use these tools.

My goal for writing children's books is to raise awareness about sickle cell in an educational and easy way. It is important to me that children understand at a young age what is happening in their bodies. If a child understands what SCD is at a young age, the child will be able to adapt more easily and better to a healthy lifestyle.

Based on the information that has reached me, I have decided to write this specific book. Pediatricians share their experiences about situations they encounter in the hospital, parents share their experiences and of course our most important group, the children share their experience in their own inspiring way.

The future for our children

As adults, we can determine the future of our children. And I choose to make a positive contribution to our children with sickle cell disease. I won't tell too much about my new book now, but I do have a few questions for parents who read this article.

Take a notebook and a pen, and write down some important things:

• How often do I take my child to the doctor?
• When do I take my child to the doctor?
• Which specialists are part of my medical team?
• What medicines does my child take and why?
• How often does my child have examinations in the hospital?
• Why are certain examinations being done?

As parents, it is our job to be aware of the most important activities our children experience, and we also need to explain this to our children. The moment you realize why a certain activity is important, you will deal with it differently. In my new book I will talk about this in detail, and I am very excited to be able to share this with you in the summer.

Let's keep shining the light on sickle cell disease!