Hannah was diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a type of bone cancer, in August 2024. An avid runner on her club cross country team, she began having persistent knee pain during training. At first, her family thought it was a typical sports injury, but imaging at a sports medicine appointment revealed something far more serious—a tumor on her knee and tibia. A surgical biopsy confirmed it was cancer.
In November 2024, Hannah underwent surgery to remove the tumor and received a full knee and tibia replacement. Thankfully, her surgeons were able to keep her limb intact. Because of her implant, though, she won’t be able to return to competitive running or the other sports she loves like basketball and lacrosse. Right now, she’s working hard with her orthopedic surgery team and physical therapist to regain movement and strength in her leg. She wears a full-length brace and is still working on bending her knee.
Hannah began chemotherapy immediately after her diagnosis. She completed two five-week cycles before surgery and is currently working through four more post-surgery cycles. Due to the intensity of her treatment, most of her chemo is done inpatient. She and her family spend three to four days at Nationwide Children’s Hospital during three out of every five weeks. It’s become their second home.
Hannah is expected to complete treatment in March or April of 2025.
Life for her family has changed dramatically. Hannah has a 13-year-old sister, and navigating the emotional and logistical challenges of long-term inpatient care has been incredibly difficult. While both parents have flexible jobs, her mom has had to take leave and reduce her workload to care for Hannah. She’s also missed much of her 4th-grade year, keeping up through one-on-one tutoring and the occasional video call with her classmates.
Despite everything, Hannah shines. She’s active, funny, and full of life. Her personality is sparkly and bright—she loves making people laugh and never lets go of her joy. Her personal mantra is “never lose your sparkle,” and she lives it every day.
She’s a huge fan of Ohio State football and basketball, the Indiana Fever and Caitlin Clark, Taylor Swift, and singing along to her favorite songs. Even in the hardest moments, Hannah’s sparkle lights up every room she’s in.
Eden was diagnosed with Osteosarcoma at the age of 14. Her diagnosis was just before Christmas in December of 2021. She had treatment until September of 2022 and was in remission for about a year. Then during a routine follow-up appointment in October of 2023, a scan of her chest showed lymphoma. She has been in treatment since, and in June of 2024 she received a bone marrow transplant.
When Eden was a freshman she was a swimmer on her high school swim team. She started having knee pain in her right leg towards the end of the season. At first, she wondered if she had perhaps injured her leg while doing a flip-turn. However, she couldn’t recall any specific incident that would have caused an injury. Despite follow-ups with various healthcare professionals, the pain continued to increase with a limp forming and getting worse the longer she went undiagnosed. It was becoming difficult for her to sleep or attend school due to the pain in her leg. Eventually, she connected with a specialist who was able to x-ray her leg and help her get further imaging that led to a diagnosis.
Eden currently has a weakened immune system. She typically social distances and isolates as much as possible. She has also had some difficulty walking and sometimes can get off balance due to some of the side effects of the prior chemotherapy. For long distances, she uses a wheelchair. For shorter distances, she used a walker.
Eden has had surgery, been under anesthesia multiple times for biopsies and placements of medical devices, and has taken multiple different medications for many different things. As a family, we are doing okay, but definitely appreciate all of the love, support, and generosity from our family, friends, and those in our community. Organizations like yours are so wonderful and truly help so much. Eden was looking for senior pictures and connecting with Kara and learning about this organization was such a blessing!
It has impacted all aspects of our family life. As a family, we have adjusted our routine as Eden now does virtual school and needs medications throughout the day. As parents, we have learned how to manage an IV line at home and administer different meds. Even with the changes to our family life, we still have fun as a family and have movie nights as well as days out on the weekends.
Eden is truly a beautiful person inside and out. She has been so resilient and has been able to maintain a positive attitude and good spirits while dealing with the most difficult of challenges. She has handled things with maturity and grace. She is a true partner in her care and advocates for herself and her needs. She has continued to complete school credits virtually and is hoping to rejoin in-person school sometime this year. Eden enjoys a variety of activities. She particularly loves theater and being on the stage in plays and musicals. Eden is also an avid reader and has shelves of books. She is interested in history and she is considering being a teacher or school guidance counselor in the future. She is also interested in pursuing opportunities in theater in the future.
Aiza loves to swim, camp, play, and is an animal lover.
Aiza was diagnosed with Osteosarcoma in August 2016. We found out after she fell and broke her arm. We took her to the ER where an x-ray showed that she had an abnormal mass in her bone.
Aiza has had chemotherapy and surgery. She also has hearing loss and some learning disabilities due to her treatments.
Mila loves art, drama, chorus, spending time with family, and soccer. She loves to laugh about anything and her laugh is infectious.
Mila is 9 years old and was diagnosed with Osteosarcoma in November 2021. Before she was diagnosed, we noticed a lump on her left forearm that kept getting bigger. She had endured 30 weeks of intense inpatient chemo, limb salvage surgery involving the removal of the radius of the left forearm, and replacement with an allograft donor bone.
Mila must limit any physical activity that could cause a fall or injury to her arm until the allograft is fully healed. Other than the obvious emotional and physical trauma for Mila and the family, cancer has taken us away from each other as Mila and mom are in the hospital, and dad was left to care for our 7-year-old son who has struggled to understand what and why this was happening.
Mila finished chemo treatment on June 23rd, we now enter the scan phase every 3 months for the next several years.
Nicholas had been complaining of a sore knee for a couple of months leading up to his diagnosis. He was 10 years old in the winter of 2018, and an amazing downhill and terrain park skier. We chalked the sore knee up to teaching himself new tricks in the terrain park. We finally took him to the doctor when ski season was over and after he complained of not being able to run fast in gym class anymore.
Nicholas sustained a spinal cord injury during his double limb-sparing surgery in the summer of 2018. He has titanium bones in both legs, both knees are artificial, and he has a lot of nerve damage. He can walk for short distances but uses a wheelchair for longer distances and to prevent injury and exhaustion. Physically, he cannot do anything the same way he did before suffering from osteosarcoma.
Our family life is completely different from what it was before Nicholas’s diagnosis. We were a very active family who loved to travel and were constantly on the move. Nicholas’s cancer diagnosis, treatment, and disability changed all of that, but we do our best to adapt and make the best of the life we have now.
This was very hard at first, but Nicholas has embraced adaptive sports and our family life slowed down quite a bit. We’ve embraced a slower pace in our family life and haven’t looked back. We’re so grateful that Nicholas is alive and here to enjoy life with us. He’s beating the odds and we never forget this. We have two dogs now and spend more time together than we ever have. We love our post-cancer family life and are so grateful.
Nicholas is a miracle. He had a single-digit chance of survival at diagnosis and had tons of rare complications and setbacks during treatment. He is NED in his legs and stable, possibly NED in his lungs.
Kiara was diagnosed with Osteosarcoma on November 18th, 2020. She was suddenly unable to walk and she had developed a serious limp basically overnight.
Kiara is often in treatment 5 days a week and barely sees her baby brother, who has just turned one. Part of her treatment plan will be to have an amputation (rotationplasty).
Our whole life has been disrupted by this terrible beast!
