14 | APRIL 8 • 2021 A merciful endeavor begun two decades ago by a Southfield rabbi to bring relief to young cancer patients has enlarged to offer encouragement and support to physically healthy, but under- privileged schoolkids in Oak Park. It’s been five years since 10-year-old cancer survivor Leah Vincenzetti became involved with Kids Kicking Cancer, the organization founded by Rabbi Elimelech Goldberg in 1999 that teaches self-control and deep breathing techniques found in the martial arts to help ameliorate ailing children’s pain. Leah’s journey typifies the nearly 12,000 youngsters who have become both warriors in (and ambassadors of) the organization over the course of its existence. Empowered with an inner strength learned through KKC’s programs, along with Goldberg’s mantra of “Power, Peace, Purpose, ” the fourth-grader speaks easily about how KKC has given her the tools to assuage the fear and pain that cancer creates. “I’ve been able to teach people power breathing so it can help them whenever they need to calm down, ” Leah explains during a Zoom conversation we had after school one day. “Or if you go to the hospital and you get nervous, it’s easier when you just breathe through it. ” Breathing through it for Leah calls upon another tool in the KKC program: the refrain of “Breathing in the light and blowing out the darkness. ” The simplicity of the message and related programming built around its ethos has resonance. The organization has grown from a local Detroit outfit to a world- wide nonprofit, with chapters in nine states and six countries across three continents. The palliative care protocol that KKC offers its clients — including those with non-cancer diseases through its Heroes Circle division — are rooted in the concept of somatic breathing: a sophisticated form of conscious breathing that teaches how to deliver more oxygen to the brain and body. The science behind deep breathing is awash with studies demonstrating empirical efficacy in reducing anxiety, pain and the effects of trauma. Western medicine has been playing catch-up to what many prac- titioners of the martial arts, like Goldberg, have known for thousands of years: The mind can play tricks, and each person has the ability to control their mind. And because conscious breathing is both an effective and low-cost way people of all ages can reduce the body’s level of cortisol — the hormone released to curb functions that would be nonessential in a fight-or-flight sit- uation — breathing techniques abound. Goldberg packaged his teaching in a way that uniquely appeals to children: through the guise of learning martial arts. HEROES CIRCLE IN OAK PARK KKC and its Heroes Circle’s successful track record helping pediatric patients led to a series of meetings that began in August 2017 between its founder and the then-superin- tendent of Oak Park Schools, Dr. Daveda Colbert. The discussions included exploring ways programming like KKC’s could be adapted to help students struggling with the myriad psycho-social problems that often plague low-income students of color. “We realized we had a tool that could accomplish great things for a great many people, children in particular” Goldberg explains. “It could lower the stress and suf- fering of children facing trauma that may not be medical in nature, but more cultural and socio-economic challenges; those challenges disproportionately fall on children of color. “ And the more we were learning about childhood trauma, in general, and how adverse childhood experiences negatively impact the immunological system, we're seeing that those children are then becoming our patients because stress severely impacts the immune system — so many parts of the human body — in a negative way. ” Colbert and Goldberg approached the D. Dan and Betty Kahn Foundation to vet the idea of creating a curriculum adhering to the state of Michigan’s educational guide- lines while also teaching students how to self-regulate, increase their attentiveness and decrease their anxiety. Like its progenitor, the curriculum would be a Trojan Horse of learning: Martial arts therapists would come to the school for in-person lessons, augmenting the curricu- lum teachers would be provided. Larry Wolfe, president of the Kahn Foundation, was convinced and gave the green light to fund a pilot program that would track the children’s progress with the help of scientists at Wayne State University Rabbi Elimelech Goldberg, known to the kids as Rabbi G., founded Kids Kicking Cancer in 1999. He and his wife lost their first child, a daughter, to leukemia in 1981 at age 2. continued on page 16 OUR COMMUNITY ON THE COVER Rabbi Goldberg’s program brings power, peace and purpose to young Oak Parkers. BRYAN GOTTLIEB CONTRIBUTING WRITER Inner Power!