Not even walking 4,000 miles across the United States can come close to the pain of losing a child.
At least, it isn’t close to the aching the Cobb family still feels every day almost two years after 8-year-old Julia died from a rare bone and tissue cancer, Ewing’s sarcoma.
The family of five — six if you count its golden retriever — needed something it could do to embrace its new, much harder, beginning since finding a “new normal (isn’t possible) after you’ve lost a child,” said Jonathan Cobb, Julia’s father.
For 10 months, the Houston family walked about 20 miles a day on its trek from Disneyland in Southern California, where it had gone months before Julia’s death, to Disney World in Orlando, where she died on her Make-A-Wish trip in October 2013. They became the first family to walk across the U.S. when they made it to Florida’s Magic Kingdom on June 21 — Father’s Day.
Throughout the 320-day, 4,000-mile journey, the caravan, including Jonathan’s wife, Jennifer; their three kids; and 14-year-old dog, stopped to speak at churches, schools and businesses. They wanted other families dealing with childhood cancer to know that they weren’t alone.
And they wanted to spread the “JuCan” message, which stems from Julia’s, “Ju,” focus on the “can” of her cancer.
"We were getting stopped 15, 20 times a day at the end," Cobb said. Social media, neon "Team JuCan" shirts and supporters throughout the country helped make the family's journey known.
Two days before she died, Julia told her mom, “I just feel so at home here (in Florida).” The family, which used to live in Wellington, Florida, is visiting friends and talking about the walk with anyone who will listen.
The idea to walk across the United States first came to Cobb when he beat his own cancer in 2006. But with four kids, eight years goes fast, so he still hadn’t made the trek when Julia died in 2013.
But he knew he had to, and he wanted his family to tag along.
“I’ve got to give him the crazy award for sure,” said Jenna, his 11-year-old daughter. When Cobb pitched the idea to his 13-year-old son, Jonathan, he thought his dad was out of his mind.
Cobb agrees that it was a bit crazy, but he says, “It’s kind of fun to do the impossible.”
With that Walt Disney quote in mind, the family set off. They walked about nine hours each day alongside an SUV carrying ice, Gatorade and plenty of Smucker’s Uncrustables. They stopped in hotels for the night, where Jennifer would sometimes stay up until 3 a.m. washing the many outfits the family had sweat through during the day’s walk.
The kids did “road school” and alternated hopping into the car to watch movies while one of their parents drove and walking.
After they arrived at the Magic Kingdom, the first question on many of their friends’ minds was, “What now?”
The Cobbs started the JuCan Foundation before the trek. Through the foundation, the Cobbs now are working on building a "Ju Castle" in Houston, where the Cobbs live, to house 500 families who are seeking medical treatment at nearby hospitals.
They are trying to find 50 to 100 acres to house the castle and raise the millions of dollars need to complete it.
“It will be a place of hope and a place of healing while you’re trying to get your victory,” Cobb said.
The Cobbs’ victory wasn’t what they were hoping for — Julia beating cancer — but they agree walking across the country from one Disney to the other wasn’t too bad of a win for the family that desperately needed one.
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