MILTON, Mass. (MyFoxBoston.com) -- When life handed a teen from Milton a tough fight, he left laughter be his guide.
Jack Robinson is a cancer survivor who spent the last year undergoing several major surgeries and 21 rounds of chemotherapy in an effort to fight a rare bone cancer. Through the treatments, the 13-year-old came to realize the old adage is true, laughter really is the best medicine.
"Jokes helped me a lot," Jack told FOX 25's Erica Ricci.
Jack says jokes are what got him through the grueling treatments, the nausea that followed, and the inability to play sports with his friends.
"It just took my mind off being sick and made me feel better so I wrote the book for other kids to make them feel better," said Jack.
The 13-year-old wrote a book called "Make 'Em Laugh" that is filled with some of his favorite one-liners, plus several contributions from other children battling cancer at Children's Hospital Boston and the Jimmy Fund at Dana-Farber.
Jack set up what he called joke boxes in the hospital and hundreds of kids dropped in jokes of their own to be included in the book.
"He would make the doctors and nurses laugh and they would come over and people'd want to know what jokes he'd collected that day," said Tisa Hughes, Jack's mother.
Tisa says the jokes brought unity and helped make light of an otherwise heavy circumstance. She was proud to type his book, to allow the same humor to heal those who Jack was not able to personally touch.
"He would sort his jokes, he would read them out loud, he would decide where they'd go in the book and then he'd hand them off and I would type," said Tisa.
The book took about six months to put together, including help from an illustrator. So far jack has sold almost 1,000 copies of his book, bringing in over $2,600. All proceeds to directly to the Jimmy Fund.
If you'd like to buy the book or learn more, visit: www.makeemlaugh.org