Chloe loves to dance! She enjoys playing with her siblings and anything related to Despicable Me and Minions. She gets excited any time she sees Minnie Mouse. It doesn’t take her long to warm up to people, and once she does she does not stop talking. She is very social. She is the youngest of our girls and is definitely the most feisty.
On January 13 of 2017, Chloe was diagnosed with stage 4 Neuroblastoma. Prior to her diagnosis, Chloe had fevers and was lethargic. She also experienced loss of appetite, had a bruise above her eye, and her eyes appeared to bulge out. She has undergone 5 cycles of induction chemotherapy, 2 cycles of high dose chemotherapy, 2 bone marrow transplants, 12 rounds of radiation, 7 surgeries, and she is currently going through her fourth cycle of immunotherapy treatment.
Chloe is our youngest of three girls, and was only 17 months old when she was diagnosed. Her father and I both wanted to stay at the hospital with her when she was admitted for her chemotherapy treatments and transplants. As a result, our two older girls had to spend a lot of time away from us. Her young sisters are unable to fully grasp everything that is happening. With that being said, they have expressed sadness and anger due to the separation. We welcomed our first baby boy in-between Chloe’s first and second transplant so we have also been adjusting to our newly expanded family during her treatment. We decided it was necessary for me to stop working in order to best care for Chloe during treatment so we also went down to one income while going through all of these other changes.
Although it has been challenging, God has brought our little warrior a mighty long way. She will be done with treatment in April, and has made amazing progress!
Aiden is a laidback, fun loving, jokester. He is so kind hearted without a mean bone in his body. He started jujitsu a few months ago to build his self-confidence and he loves it. He is also a twin and has a fantastic relationship with his twin brother.
We believe he may have had his tumor in utero, but doctors are unable to confirm this. He cried a lot since birth. In the beginning, they told me it was colic, then teething. At nine months, he was diagnosed with Neuroblastoma after he lost movement in his legs. The tumor was compressing his spine and was wrapped around the upper part of his spine. He could have become a quadriplegic. He was given a 20% prognosis and it was in ICU. After a lot of treatment, Aiden slowly got better.
Aiden suffers daily with learning issues. His working memory is poor, he is unable to read, and has a speech delay. Aiden suffered a lot of trauma due to his treatment and was non-verbal at 3. As a result, he is developmentally delayed. He is currently in 2nd grade and deals with great frustration on a daily basis, because he wants to read so badly. It breaks our hearts.
Aiden is now a 5 year survivor! But we constantly worry about relapse. As a parent, I definitely experienced PTSD symptoms for a few years. We are in a better place now, but still deal with anxiety, depression and occasional nightmares. We are so proud of Aiden. We couldn’t imagine our life without him.
Autumn is the strongest person I know. She is courageous, social, and amazingly beautiful. Before diagnosis, everyone was fascinated by this strong willed energetic child, wondering who she would become.
On 11/27/17, Autumn was diagnosed with stage IV neuroblastoma. Leading up to her diagnosis she experienced fever, fatigue, and mobility regression.
David, who we call “King David” was named after King David in the bible. David is the youngest of 4 children. He loves music and is a very happy energetic boy. He brings a smile to everyone’s face that he meets.
I noticed that David’s belly was getting big. It resembled the shape of a football. His pediatrician said that David was healthy at his 18-month checkup. A week later David had a high fever of 103. He was taken to the urgent care and was diagnosed with an ear infection and was put on antibiotics. Two weeks later the same symptoms appeared. He had a high fever and we weren’t able to break it. He was seen by his pediatrician and was diagnosed again with an ear infection and was given a stronger dose of antibiotics. A few weeks passed and the high fever was back, this time David did not want to eat and was very lethargic. He was taken to the pediatrician and was diagnosed again with another ear infection.
I wasn’t pleased with the diagnosis. I took David to the nearest hospital for evaluation. I requested that they do some blood work on him and to take an x-ray of his stomach because it appeared big and firm. This was April 3, 2017. He was only 19 months old. We were admitted that same day and later in that week he was diagnosed with Stage 3 high-risk Neuroblastoma. Our family has been devastated by the news.
It was hard to balance while David was impatient receiving care. He spends 21 days in the hospital. He is so young and unaware of what is taking place. Our world was turned upside down. No one in our family has childhood cancer and I only knew of one other child that had it. The children’s hospital has became our second home. It was difficult for his older siblings to be separated from him. But with support and prayer, we were able to make it through treatment. David did well with chemotherapy. He breezed right through treatment and was 3 months ahead of schedule. His side effects have been minimal. He was still that happy dancing kid, dancing down the hallway with his IV pole. His tumor resection surgery was a breeze. Hours after surgery he was up and playing. I can only account for 8 days that he was down throughout this whole treatment process. He completed 7 rounds of chemo with 2 stem cell transplants, tumor resection surgery and has completed 2 rounds of chemotherapy and 1 out of 5 rounds of immunotherapy.
Our family moto is ” Fight like a King”. David has slayed his giant!
Ariya is known around the hospital as miss smiley. She has throughout her journey, had an amazing happy disposition and says hello to everyone. Her smile is what gets people and we couldn’t be more proud of her. She loves the Wiggles, Sesame street, Music, Dancing, People…We were lucky enough to get to see the Wiggles. And even more so a friend of a friend arranged a meet an greet which was so special to us all. She had a blast!
Ariya has gone through countless pokes, prodes, sedations, scans, ultrasounds, xrays etc.. Since she was 6 months old when we first noticed her puffy eye. From then we have had to fight to get answers which came at the age of 10 months with her Neuroblastoma diagnosis. Ariya had 6 rounds of chemo (all in hospital stays), 8 blood transfusions, 4 platelet transfusions, two surgeries, 8 or so ER trips all for fevers, one resulting in a very scary experience of a blood line infection. She has a low immune system. Eating is a challenge, as she missed an important window of learning to eat and relied heavily on feeding tube.
This has been a constant roller coaster. Its crazy how quickly things can change. We have many blessings too though. We get to know some amazing families and kids going through similar experiences. Ariya is proof that anyone can move moutains no matter your battle, whether you big or small, as long as you put all your heart and soul in each moment.
Serenity’s nickname is Blueberry! She is three years old with a little bit of blonde fuzz on her head. Blueberry is full of sass and love. She loves when her uncles chase her around or pretend to drink her make believe coffee. Blueberry has a love for animals, but cows are definitely her favorite. She loves her twin sisters Faith and Hope! She loves to watch all the Disney movies her Nana has provided her. Blueberry’s favorite thing to drink is white Gatorade. She won’t drink any other kind. She’s full of life and she brings so much joy!
On February 8th of 2017, we were shocked to discover Blueberry had Neuroblastoma. Her only symptom being “raccoon” eyes. Blueberry has had six cycles of chemotherapy, major tumor removal surgery, one cycle of immunotherapy (in treatment for second cycle) and radiation.
My family is struggling financially as well as emotionally. We struggle to all have quality family time together. We didn’t know about childhood cancer. We had an idea, but it we didn’t really know until it was right there in our faces. No child or family deserves this.
