By Phaedran Linger
Baltimore Watchdog Staff Writer
Pain engulfed Howard County resident Sonia Su as she sat in BWI in June, 2018, returning abruptly from her study abroad trip to Asia. A phone call arrived. “Sonia,” the voice on the other end said, “based on your symptoms it looks like you’ve relapsed.”
Su was diagnosed earlier that year with an aggressive type of non-Hodgkins lymphoma as a 24-year-old graduate student. She relapsed twice during the year until she was admitted for CAR T-call immunotherapy. Now 27, she has fought off the disease and graduated from Georgetown University with a Master’s degree – all during a pandemic.
This March marks two years since her last treatment, and she is celebrating it with her own organization that she founded: Kits to Heart.
Kits to Heart is a Baltimore non-profit that takes the motto “it’s the little things” literally. The organization provides support for cancer patients in the form of care packages.
“It was a project that turned into an organization that I’m really proud to be working on,” she said.
Su was amid her young adulthood. She was pursuing a college degree and travelling the world, but hospital trips, relapses and treatments from cancer put her life on hold.
One day as she sat in the hospital, she received her first care package, which was given to her by a survivor who had stayed in the same unit. “Just knowing that (she survived) motivated me to keep going at my lowest point,” Su said.
This encounter led her to found Kits to Heart, which has provided over 1,200 cancer kits to patients in Maryland and Washington, DC, as well as shipping them to people across the country.
“I wanted to give back to the cancer community after having been inspired as a patient by receiving a care package from a stranger,” Su said.
The little white boxes contain resources for patients like water bottles, ginger chews for nausea, journals, sunscreen for sensitive skin, informational pamphlets, and blankets that comfort patients in their time of need.
Kits to Heart is unique because it has a personal touch to it that comes from Su’s involvement in local Baltimore businesses.
“One of the main focuses I wanted to emphasize was supporting local businesses and female founders, especially during the pandemic,” she said.
District BATCH, a Baltimore-based skincare business owned by Marisa Martino, works with Kits to Heart to provide soaps, lotions and other skincare needs for the kits.
Martino said that it can be difficult to work with small businesses because of the expenses, but it’s so important because it cultivates a community of thoughtful business owners who help one another.
“I think it’s awesome that Sonia makes it work,” Martino said. “Kits to Heart is a small business that manages to thoughtfully include other small businesses. Bravo! Being a part of Kits to Heart has been great exposure for District BATCH and we feel good about it.”
Using businesses like these also gives Su a chance to customize the kits so that they can align with her beliefs in providing organic, non-GMO and sustainable products.
“With my experience in the hospital, I was given protein shakes with lists of ingredients that I had no idea how to pronounce, and when you’re already in chemotherapy, you don’t want to put more unknowns into your body,” Su said.
For Su, her experience with cancer also left her traumatized. This is often an aspect of cancer people neglect to acknowledge, and she said the mission of her business is to relieve patients of this PTSD by providing material and psycho-social support.
Laurie Waldo, a clinical social work team leader at the University of Maryland Medical Center, said: “For most cancer diagnoses, the treatment is often very intense. People are sometimes coming to the hospital five days a week. It’s like a job; they may be spending all day here. Outside of what a cancer diagnosis means and how scary that is, it is also logistically challenging.”
People may think this business is just goodie bags at first look, but upon further inspection it becomes so much more than that.
The care packages are like an important screw to a part of the larger mechanism of cancer treatment. From Su’s point of view, they make sure the whole person is being cared for, and it lets them know that a whole community is rooting for them.
“When it comes to mental health, hospitals can’t do all that,” Su said. “Their main focus is keeping the patient in physical health.”
As of now, Su runs the organization by herself with some help from her family and volunteers. Days before, she hand-packs all the boxes, then stuffs her car up with all the supplies and starts her trip to the hospital.
The care packages come as a unisex kit that is suitable for all ages, but they can be customized for a patient upon request online to accommodate age, interests and specific needs.
When she arrives, hospital workers meet her outside and the boxes are handed off to them for distribution to cancer patients throughout the hospital. After the pandemic, she hopes to deliver them to the patients herself.
“Especially in the pandemic patients weren’t able to have visitors with them and I can’t imagine the exacerbated loneliness,” Su said. “It comes to a complete surprise to them when suddenly their social worker brings them goodies and an inspiring story.”
In light of her story and anniversary, she has done five different drop offs in the month of March, and last Wednesday, March 17, she did a drop off at the Greater Medical Center and John Hopkins Green Spring Station.
Through cancer and a pandemic, Su’s indomitable optimism leaves her undefeated and with an organization that gives her a platform to share that.
As she put it, “I receive joy by giving joy.”