Caring Community Pulls Together to Send Abby To Camp

EAST HAMPTON, NY - East Hampton residents have hearts of pure gold.

After they heard about a GoFundMe account, "Let's Send Abby to Camp," to help a beloved local East Hampton young woman, Abagail Dunham, go to camp, they stepped up in a big way.

The page, created by Edie Lester-Smith, has raised $1,730 of its $1,200 goal in just nine days; extra funds will be used to buy Abby a new wheelchair with accessories, as well as two new travel bags for Abby, Lester-Smith said. She added that Abby would love a purple bathing suit, too.

"I'd better get busy and find one. We will take her shopping soon. She will be so happy. She is such a good girl and really needs fun times and happiness. She has hope and dreams. I'm so glad we all gave her camp this summer. Wish we could give her the world," Lester-Smith wrote.

The appeal started with Lester-Smith learned that Abby wanted to go to sleepover camp. "Abby is not a child, she is 22 years old, a full grown woman, with the sweet disposition of a child. Abby has had 111 brain and spine surgeries since birth and suffers severe seizures. Her journey has been hard and she has suffered many different kinds of trauma. Who knows what else life has in store for Abby?" she wrote on the page.

Abby, Lester-Smith said, is now living in Maine, where there's a "wonderful camp that is set up to handle all of Abby’s needs with 24-hour care," the Pine Tree Society for the Handicapped. "I want so much to bring her a week of socializing with her peers and the happiness that making new friends can bring her. For those of you who know Abby – you know how happy this will make her," she wrote.

Along with the $1,900 camp cost — Abby needed $500 after a grant — there is also a long list of items that she must purchase. "It sure would be nice if Abby could get a few new things to wear to camp. After all, she is a girl and doesn’t every young girl need to look her best?" Lester-Smith wrote. "On top of that, she will need a lot of personal supplies."

She added, "I want to make her smile with a trip of a lifetime. Every little bit will help. If Abby can smile, the rest of the world should smile, too."