The best way to describe Aurora’s Cosmopolitan Club: Small but mighty.
The local chapter of this international organization, founded in 1918 and started here in Aurora nine years later, only has a handful of registered members these days, along with another half-dozen “friends” of the club.
But what they manage to accomplish is more than impressive. It’s a testament to the sheer determination and generous spirit of this group that, since 1973, made their mission a fight against diabetes.
Although the Cosmo Club is now too small to hold fundraisers, they still manage to defy expectations by donating to dozens of causes. Last year, for example, they organized a diabetic screening with Rush Copley nurses that tested 223 people, including one who turned out to be in an emergency situation.
The local organization also gives to other nonprofits, including National Night Out, Kendall County Back to School Fair, World Relief, Three Fires Boy Scout Council and Aurora Historical Society. They have donated toys, books, blankets and other such items to Fox Valley United Way, CASA, Markland and Association for Individual Development, and have provided 500 gift cards for Hesed House Easter baskets, as well as personal care baskets for Mutual Ground.
The group works closely with Rush Copley Medical Center in Aurora. Club President Donna Carter is program coordinator for the hospital’s Diabetes Center, and this service organization has for years taken part in Rush Copley’s “Rock the Heart” fundraiser. Most recently, a dinner was held at Fireside Inn in Sugar Grove where the club handed a $2,000 check to the Aurora medical center’s Diabetic Education Program that provides help for the uninsured and underinsured.
But that gathering before the Thanksgiving holiday was special for another reason.
Among the guests were the families of three children with Type 1 diabetes who, with financial help from the Cosmopolitan Club, will soon be getting service dogs that are specially-trained to detect high or low levels of blood sugar and alert with a paw or a nudge before it becomes a medical emergency.
Olive Schwerha, a Downers Grove second-grader, will meet Rez, a yellow lab finishing his training in Arizona next year; Luka Seljakov, 12, and little brother Aca, 3, from Brookfield, will receive their alert dog Lina this spring; and second-grader Mia Young of Oswego will be greeting her dog Max in January.
These dogs, which go through a two-year training and cost anywhere between $15,000 and $20,000, are made possible because of the Ron and Vicki Santo Diabetic Alert Dog Foundation, with the Aurora club picking up a portion of that cost – somewhere between $1,200 and $3,000 per animal, said LaVonne Hawking, club secretary/treasurer and retired mid-states governor.
“Each case is different. It really depends on the family situation and the animal’s training,” she continued, adding that these dogs have been “life-changing” for the two families who received them with the club’s help in previous years.
Also attending the dinner was Conner Limberg, whose dog Rizzo has accompanied him everywhere for the last seven years, including classes at Yorkville High School, where he is a senior.
The local Cosmopolitan Club did not help pay for his black goldendoodle, but members are especially fond of this pair because it was at an event they were hosting about five years ago when Rizzo alerted to a guest who was an undiagnosed diabetic. As it turned out, the man was hospitalized with an insulin count so dangerous the dog quite possibly saved his life, said Hawking.
While no dog can be 100% reliable, Conner’s mother Jessica can certainly attest to the “peace of mind” that comes with having Rizzo as part of the family. Because glucose monitors can fail, the service animal adds another valuable layer of protection that helps her sleep at night, she told me.
The hope of these parents and the Cosmo Club is that some day Rizzo, Lina, Max and Rez will only have to be family pets.
According to dinner guest Thomas Grimes, a member of the far-larger Rockford chapter and president-elect of Cosmopolitan Club International, a “breakthrough” treatment using islet cells “points to hope” for the 1.25 million American children and adults who have this chronic disease caused by the body’s inability to make insulin.
While the treatment, he told the group, is still considered experimental in the U.S., Grimes is confident the strong collaboration between research programs in Florida and Canada could make a cure possible in five years.
Until then, parents like Marina Kalic (mother to Luka and Aca), Dani and Matt Schwerha and Kristen and Kevin Young must go to extraordinary lengths to keep their children healthy. It’s a topic that resulted in plenty of table-talk as these families met for the first time, thanks to the generosity of this handful of dedicated Aurora Cosmo members that also includes Dean Bisconti, Gary Christensen, Kelly Quinn and Vic and Rita Smith.
Raising a child with diabetes requires a special level of commitment to help these youngsters not only enjoy a normal, active childhood, but teach them how to someday manage this condition on their own. Having alert dogs as part of that family, the parents tell me, truly is a gift.
“We are known as the best-kept secret service organization in Aurora,” said Hawking, adding that it “is an honor” to be so trusted.
As small as they are, she noted, “our club is very important to the community.”
dcrosby@tribpub.com
