After their 2-year-old son, Jake, died from cancer in August 2014, Mark and Denise Staniszewski said instead of remaining private, they wanted to keep Jake’s memory alive and support other families experiencing similar circumstances.
Mark and Denise spend their free time working on “Jake’s Jammies,” a project created by Ashley Wade of the non-profit Ashley Wade Foundation, which collects pajamas and distributes them to children at local hospitals.
“I think it’s a way to keep Jake’s memory alive,” said Mark, a lieutenant and deputy commanding officer of the Lake Success Police Department. “Through our journey we were always pretty vocal in the way of trying to surround him with love and support and now this is a way we can continue that.”
Jake was diagnosed with a rare, aggressive form of cancer called Alveolar Rhabdomyosarcoma when he was 14 months old.
The Staniszewski’s, residents of Garden City, said doctors told them their son had no chance of surviving, so they searched for alternative options to try and save him.
“We couldn’t fathom treating him in the way that’s being done here, which involved a lot of harsh side effects and seeing him suffer when they weren’t giving him a chance,” Denise said.
The family decided Denise should take Jake to Germany, where they found treatments not offered in the United States.
While living with Jake in Germany for eight months, Denise said, she saw Jake’s condition improve at times, but she returned with Jake when his condition worsened and it was determined that he would not survive.
It was back in America where the Staniszewskis met Wade.
They said they did not know how Wade found out about Jake, but one day she contacted the family and said she wanted to meet him and his older brother, Luke, who is now 7 years old.
“I don’t even believe they make people like this,” Denise said. “Women this age are just thinking of themselves. This girl gets up at night thinking about how she’s going to help kids.”
After Jake died, Wade texted Mark and asked him if she could go through with her idea of donating pajamas to sick children in Jake’s name, to which he agreed.
Pajamas were a big source of Jake’s comfort during treatment, Mark said, choosing to wear his pajamas rather than the gowns provided by the hospital.
Wade began collecting donated pajamas, pressing a “Jake’s Jammies” emblem on them and tagging them with a card that shows a picture of Jake and words about him.
“She had a soft spot for Jake and when he passed she wanted to do something in his honor,” Denise said. “Rather than donate to a big organization where you wonder where the money goes, buying these pajamas you know it’s going to a child.”
While the family was grieving, Denise said, they were unaware of the amount of work Wade was doing with “Jake’s Jammies.”
She added that Wade came to their home this summer to deliver pajamas to Luke and they discovered she had been delivering “Jake’s Jammies” once a month to sick children at Winthrop-University Hospital.
“She didn’t bother us because she knew we were grieving. She felt like this is something she wanted to do,” Denise said. “When she came over, had we known the degree of what she was doing, we would have been involved in this.”
Since finding out about Wade’s successes, Mark and Denise began an effort to expand “Jake’s Jammies” through schools across the North Shore and the Village of Lake Success.
Various schools including Great Neck South High School have held pajama drives for “Jake’s Jammies,” and the Village of Lake Success currently has donation boxes at Village Hall and at the Lake Success police headquarters.
The family announced last Friday from the “Love for Jake” Facebook page that Wade told them a total of 1,000 pajamas had been donated.
“It’s sometimes the little things that you do for these kids that make a huge difference. I know from going through it for a year and a half with my son,” Denise said. “In a regular life, you don’t think about what these people are experiencing living in a hospital. In my opinion it’s like hell on earth. It’s so miserable. When someone comes in and gives you a fresh pair of pajamas, it’s these little things that make a child’s day.”
