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Cancer survivor and Make-A-Wish recipient Sarah O’Neill gives back to her Ontario community

Sarah O'Neill of London, Ontario, was diagnosed with rhabodomyosarcoma, a rare form of childhood cancer, when she was 10 years old.

After undergoing three surgeries, 50 chemotherapy sessions and 25 radiation treatments that year, the Make-A-Wish Foundation sent O'Neill and her family to the Atlantic Paradise Island resort in the Bahamas for five days.

"I think that's what my family needed to mesh back together fully. That year had stretched us in different ways," O'Neill, now 18, told the London Free Press.

Now fully recovered, O'Neill is paying back that life-changing wish, promoting the Make-A-Wish Foundation Southern Ontario by attending cheque presentations, doing radio promotions and speaking at events.

"I think it is very important to give back. I never felt I had the right to that wish, I have always felt I should give it back," O'Neill told London Community News. "I thought I should volunteer enough to make back the money so someone else could have the wish. I felt it isn't something everyone gets, not something you can expect. So I think that's why I feel I need to repay it."

She added, "Make A Wish is the most fun charity to be involved in. Telling kids they can have a wish, a wish that is as unique as they are, it is just wonderful to be a part of."

With dreams of becoming a paediatric oncologist, O'Neill is currently studying biological and medical sciences at the University of Western Ontario.

"Giving back and treating children with cancer, that's amazing," O'Neill said.