Artful Escapes: Avery’s Story
The Alberta Children's Hospital has become like a second home to Avery, who was born with kidney complications. It was there Avery discovered Art Therapy, one among a suite of donor-funded Therapeutic Art programs that include Music Therapy and Horticultural Therapy.
Avery, 14, knows every nook and cranny of the Alberta Children’s Hospital — a frequent flier since the ripe old age of 23 days, she’s quick to call it her second home.
Avery was born with kidney complications, something her parents Samantha and Andrew anticipated after an ultrasound showed an abnormality. It was a fever that first brought Avery to emergency at three weeks old. She would ultimately spend the next six months in hospital, allowing little Avery to grow big enough for experts to remove one of her tiny kidneys.
While the family had hoped the nephrectomy would solve Avery’s issues, frequent infections would see them in touch with the on-call nephrologist or bring them back to the Emergency Department. Mom can’t count the number of nights they spent in hospital in those early years.
It was during this time Avery discovered Art Therapy, one among a suite of donor-funded Therapeutic Art programs that include Music Therapy and Horticultural Therapy.
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Supported by donors, Art Therapy offers individual and group sessions for inpatients and day treatment groups several times a week in the Claudia & Randy Findlay Therapeutic Arts Studio.
For Avery, those sessions would ignite a passion that continues today.
‘Little room of happiness’
“It was like walking into a school art room with easels and paints everywhere, and this big closet with so many art supplies, whatever you wanted to do,” says Avery.
“I had a lot of friends who were taking their kids to art class or dance class that we didn’t get to sign up for. So, to have a place where she could go and be a typical kid, to have that experience, it made it feel a lot more like what a first-time parent should be experiencing,” says Avery’s mom, Samantha.
“Art became a daily thing she would ask for at the Alberta Children’s Hospital. If she wasn’t feeling well, or the antibiotics made her feel crummy, or her IV had blown, she always wanted to do art and it always put a smile on her face. For us, it was a place we could hear her laugh — a little room of happiness.”
Avery is thankful for the generous community support for programs like art therapy, which help brighten the days in hospital.
“It definitely sparked a light for me — thank you for continuing to help make it available so more kids can get creative.”
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