Julissa is a free spirit. She is 3 years old and quite the diva! She loves to dress up in her princess outfits and crowns. She laughed a lot when we shaved off what was left of her hair. Wrestling matches with her daddy on the living room floor will always get loud laughs out of her! She collects Shopkins and Tsum Tsums. In December of 2015, Julissa was experiencing frequent fevers for a number of weeks accompanied by loss of appetite and energy. She was extremely tired all of the time. We then discovered she had acute lymphocytic leukemia or ALL. ALL is the most common childhood cancer and occurs when bone marrow cells have errors in their DNA. The cause of ALL is unknown.
Julissa has had chemotherapy since December. She has been on steroids which gave her diabetes as a side effect. Thank God that is behind us! She has had numerous spinal taps. Chemotherapy has been given through her port and oral pills. She just hit the maintenance phase of treatment and we are rejoicing! Low immune system counts sometimes cause her to stay home and away from others in an attempt to prevent sickness or infection of any kind.
We are trying to live life as “normal” as we possibly can. Things have been much better in the past few months. Blood counts have been high and that allows us to get out of the house. We were deeply affected in the beginning emotionally, mentally, spiritually, and financially. We are now accustomed to this new way of life and we take it a day at a time. Julissa has responded so well to treatment which makes it a lot better on all of us.
She is amazing my family and I will continue prayers for this awesome child that we hope to meet someday.❤