Jane was diagnosed with ALL on December 9, 2018. She had been looking very pale, was asking to be carried a lot, and had a fall where her legs gave out from under her. We rushed to urgent care, then a local hospital emergency department, and were ultimately sent into Boston after review of Jane’s blood work.
It has been a long, hard couple of years of treatment. It’s hard to try to communicate what Jane and our family have been through. In terms of medical treatments and procedures, Jane has had surgery to insert her port, IV chemotherapy, oral chemotherapy, sedation, lumbar punctures with intrathecal chemotherapy (chemo injected into the spinal fluid), allergic reactions to chemo, fungal pneumonia, RSV, intubation, a week on a ventilator, re-learning to walk (twice), high-dose chemo inpatient hospital stays, influenza, and lots of emergency department visits.
We struggle with all she has been through, lots of feelings of helplessness and sadness, but also so much gratitude for strength and resilience and everyone that helped us step forward into each day until we arrived at the end of treatment.
Cancer changes a lot of things for families. At the time of diagnosis, I had just returned to work after maternity leave with our new baby boy Charlie. We were living with my parents, in the middle of building a house. It was such an incredibly challenging and heart-wrenching time, but dealing with watching your child fight cancer changes your perspective in many ways.
There is a quote I love: “My barn having burned down, I can now see the moon.” – Mizuta Masahide. Our family sees the moon more often these days.
Hope session by Charlie Little Photography | Instagram