It is now ten years since the young Sétoise, who was only a child at the time, was diagnosed with ALL, cancer of the blood and bone marrow. If she is alive today, it is thanks to the donors.
It is with great emotion that Hanna speaks of her experience. With a gentle face and a joyful look, she testifies: “We do not realize the seriousness of the disease at the time, we suffer without really understanding, especially when we are children”. However, his illness is far from trivial. Ella spent four years going to hospitals almost every day, chaining chemotherapy, sterile rooms, transfusion of blood and platelets, then a long phase of remission. With humility, the high school student confides: “As a recipient I had a responsibility: I had to survive for all the people who gave me”, this is what pushed her to fight.
“It’s nothing and it saves lives”
But it is only after the fact that the young girl becomes aware of the exceptionality of her childhood, “I was more mature than the others in college”. At the time, barely recovered from her leukemia, the teenager was misunderstood, she was judged because she liked to show her joy at being alive. “It’s a strange feeling, knowing that we owe our lives to strangers”. Frustrated, Hanna repeats that “people don’t realize how important small actions like donating blood can be”. On this point she insists: “to give his blood, it’s nothing and it saves lives, literally”.
In her family, only her grandmother gave blood when she was sick. Hanna is proud of herself, who “gave until she was told she was too old to give.” Among the fifty bags of blood that the teenager received, one of them may come from her grandmother. Her father has always refused to give, despite the thousand and one arguments that his daughter puts forward to him. She resigned herself; “It’s his choice, I can’t blame him”. Having traveled to England during the mad cow era, his mother could never give.
Committed to raising awareness
Hanna has only one regret at the moment, it is not being able to donate her blood in return, the donation being impossible for the people who have received.. “I can not do anything to thank all these people who gave me”. Raising awareness is her best way to act to return the generosity that saved her. “I contacted the EFS and my high school nurse, I will speak in front of the class about blood, platelets and bone marrow, because the subject is too little known in high school”.
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