Noah and his family love to joke, laugh and watch Duck Dynasty. He also loves fast sports cars like Lamborghinis! Noah was diagnosed with high risk acute lymphoblastic leukemia on August 8th, 2015. He had a fever and was very tired for two and half weeks leading up to his diagnosis. He is beginning his treatment journey and has been going through some really intense chemotherapy. His diagnosis has been hard on his family but they are great supporters of Noah (check out their shaved heads!). Noah loved having his session at a local skate park and had so much fun sliding down all the ramps!
Lucas was diagnosed with Leukemia on March 31st, 2010. He was only 4 years old. His treatment lasted 3 years and 3 months. He has been off treatment for 2 years and doing great. Now he is currently going to the survivor clinic every 3 months for blood work and late chemo side effects. He is brave and a survivor!
“Olivia was 19 months old when she was diagnosed with very high risk T-Cell ALL. Her disease did not respond to standard treatment and it was determined that she would require a bone marrow transplant in order to have any hope for survival. Thanks to an anonymous donor, she received her second chance at life, just a few days after her second birthday. She has now been in remission for over three years and has been living a very normal and happy life. We were lucky enough to be able to meet her wonderful donor this past December and thank him personally. Although Olivia will be followed by a rather large team of medical specialists for the rest of her life, we are beyond grateful that she is still here with us today. We are also very thankful for organizations like The Gold Hope Project, that help us to document her life. These are truly priceless gifts for our family.”
Savannah was diagnosed on March 4, 2013 with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. She is currently in treatment and will be, for the next 2 or more years. At the time of diagnosis we were home in Oregon, staying with family while my husband was deployed to (we were stationed in Germany at the time) Afghanistan. I was 8 months pregnant when Savannah was diagnosed. Needless to say, it was a very difficult time! She is 5 months in and doing great. We are so proud of our girl!
On April 26th, 2012, after battling a sore throat for several weeks Brianne was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia. Brianne was 6 years old at the time and in 1st Grade. Two years later Brianne is getting ready to finish treatment next month on June 30th, 2014. She will be finishing 3rd Grade and is a straight A student. She loves spending time with her friends, working on crafts, and swimming.
Hope Session by Joyful Gestures Photography. website | facebook
Nicholas was diagnosed with pre-B ALL on April 2nd, 2013. Based on his white counts upon diagnosis, he is also categorized as ‘high-risk’, referring to risk of relapse. This happened so fast…
Nico had been acting completely normal in the weeks leading up to his diagnosis. On Thursday, March 28th he came home with a bruise under his hair that looked really bad – blue/purple raised bump. You would have assumed he hit the corner of a table or something. However, his sitter said nothing happened that made him cry that day. Seemed strange. Over the weekend, a couple more bruises appeared and we began to get concerned. Also, he LOVES playing football outside with Daddy and one night after going out, he came back inside and curled up with me. We watched it for a couple of days but by Monday night I knew it was time to call the doctor. Although 2 year old boys have bumps and bruises, this was different. I called on Tuesday and we went in that afternoon.
We only spent about 15 minutes with our doctor before she sent us to Children’s Hospital in Oakland. It was in those moments with her that the reality set in that this was not good. She didn’t say cancer, but in her compassionate yet serious way in my heart I knew that was what we were facing. For some reason I had dropped Julia with a friend instead of taking her to the doctors with me so luckily I was able to take Nicholas right in. I called Chris on the way and he met me there.
We were terrified as we had his blood drawn but in talking with the ER doc, Nicholas didn’t appear as pale and with a swollen spleen that most leukemia kids do so he said not to let our minds go there. He was thinking it might be ITP, a condition with low platelet count that isn’t life threatening. It only took about 30 minutes to get the results back and the doctor walked in with a nurse (or doctor? I can’t even remember) and sat down. He said “So it’s not going to be ITP”. I remember Chris looking at him and asking “well then what is it?”. “It’s the other one, he has leukemia”.
I’m not sure I can adequately put to words what we went through in the next hour(s). The doctor stayed in the room with us while we sobbed (wailed), and tried to process what he just said. I remember Chris asking at one point “are you sure?”. All this time we of course had Nicholas with us, who didn’t feel well and was tired and sick of being in this room. My head was throbbing beyond anything I’d ever felt, our chests felt like the world was collapsing it. It was awful. We had to wait hours for a bed to get ready on the oncology floor. I climbed on the ER bed with Nicholas and he fell asleep on me. They brought us up to the 5th floor in a wheelchair and we began our journey.
Over the next 24 hours we learned that Nicholas has pre-B ALL, which we were actually praying it was ALL and not AML. Compounding all our fears was that Chris’ brother, Dave, died from AML in 2004. Every person’s case is different and we kept being told to focus on Nicholas and that ALL was “better” than AML with regard to cure rates. We then had so many decisions to make regarding whether to put him on study, what type of central line, etc etc. With input from friends in the medical field, strength and love from our family & friends we navigated those first few days. He’ll be treated for 3.5 years and this type of cancer is CURABLE….we just need to get him through this.
