How do you measure joy?

Yuliia Barsukova · Founder, Smile Optimistic Studio CIC

Systems love what can be measured. How many children were reached. How many sessions were delivered. How many outcomes were recorded.

But how do you measure joy? In grams? In minutes of laughter? In smiles per day?

I have known some of the brightest, funniest children, who died of cancer. However often they smiled, it did not save them — just as their parents’ tears could not change the outcome of treatment.

So I will never claim that play or joy cures cancer.

What I will say is this: childhood loses a great deal when illness stops a child from playing, laughing, wondering, choosing and inventing.

We cannot always change the outcome of treatment. We can influence how a child lives through the time inside it.

That is often the hardest thing for a system to measure. For me, it is where quality of life begins.

A personal perspective by Yuliia Barsukova. This article is not clinical advice and does not replace psychological support.