By DEVIN HEILMAN

Staff writer

POST FALLS — It’s not easy being a young person with cancer.

“You’re always pegged as the sick kid,” said Jacob Lockhart, 19, of Hayden. “You’ve got scars you always have to explain to people, that’s for sure."

Lockhart was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia at a very young age. He doesn't remember much of his treatment because he was so little, but he does remember discovering a place where he felt like he fit right in — Camp Journey.

“I’d never experienced a place where so many people had experienced so many things that I had,” he said.

Lockhart went to Camp Journey when he was 11. He met other kids with cancer and cancer-related illnesses, shared stories and participated in essential summer camp activities like swimming, crafts and games.

His leukemia has been in remission for 10 years, and now Lockhart has graduated to camp counselor. He just spent the week as a positive role model to other kiddos experiencing childhood cancer.

"Sometimes you forget your roots, and I need to come here to see what courage looks like. The kids are the embodiment of it," Lockhart said, with a group of campers playing on the lawn near him. “These kids are strong."

Today is the last day of the 2017 Camp Journey resident camp, which takes place for a week each year at Ross Point Baptist Camp in Post Falls.

Camp Journey (formerly Camp Goodtimes) is packed full of summer fun with special oncology-trained staff and resources on site to ensure campers at any stage of cancer treatment and remission can enjoy being a kid.

"I was just expecting regular summer camp, and that’s what it’s become, just regular summer camp," said Sam Molen, 22, of Billings, Mont. "Even with all the kids taking meds and everything else, you see everyone bond.”

Molen was diagnosed with Hodgkin's lymphoma at 8. He started coming to Camp Journey with his sister in 2004 and it became their summer tradition. Now, as a counselor, he is happy to share his experiences with the campers and give them the hope and pep talk they might need to get through a rough time.

"I sat next to this little girl yesterday at lunch, and she said she had a port, so I showed her my scar and said, ‘I had a port too.’ She’s like, ‘You had cancer?’ It was really cool," he said. "Everyone fits in well together, there’s no real insecurities here."

Campers enjoyed ropes courses, making sushi, kayaking, outdoor movies, robotics, archery and a plethora of other camp activities.

Leader-in-training Mia Moore, 17, of Clarkston, is in her final year as a camper before she returns as a counselor in 2019 (they're required to take a year off before becoming counselors). She's been a camper for 11 years; she first came to Journey as a little girl with a brainstem tumor. She didn't know anyone.

That all changed when she made lifelong friends that first year.

“It’s just a family place here,” she said. “We’re all one big family. I’m so happy that we all create that bond.”

One of the realities of a summer camp for kids battling cancer is that for some of them, they never come back. Mia said that's why Camp Journey campers are so close.

"There have been campers that have passed away from their cancer because it didn’t get any better,” she said, taking a moment to catch a breath and allow her tears to fall.

"You know them so well and when you find out what happens to them, it's so hard because what they go through is so hard," she said. "It's not fair, but that's how you know the bonds can be so close, because you're with them all the time."

The founders and counselors of Camp Journey know their campers are up against these physical and emotional difficulties, so they exude positivity and wrap their campers in good vibes.

Jacob Bonwell, camp counselor and Journey co-founder, talked about raising funds for the camp — which doesn't charge the families to attend — and the joy he experiences taking a week off from his job as a chemical engineer to help these kids have an amazing time.

“This week has been awesome. A lot of new campers, a lot of campers that are in treatment currently," he said. “Even though it’s hot, all the kids are having a great time. All happy, smiles on their faces. They’re just loving it."

Bonwell and his colleagues organize the Sweethearts' Ball each spring to help raise funds for the camp, which serves kids throughout the Northwest and beyond. It will be held April 7 next year.

The "Kickin Cancer in the Grass" Footgolf Tournament to benefit Camp Journey will be held Aug. 19 at Eagle Ridge Golf Course in south Spokane.

Info: www.sweetheartsball.com or www.thesweetheartsball.schoolauction.net/footgolftournament2017