Note: I am participating in a seven-day blogging challenge,
called the Write Tribe Festival of Words. Write Tribe is an online community of
bloggers that “urges you to write bravely.” The day six prompt is to either
feature a guest blog post or to interview someone. I am sharing parts of two
interviews that I did recently with parents of children who have been diagnosed
with cancer.
link to Write Tribe
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| Matthew and Mark, honorary survivors at the 2017 Grand Island Relay for Life, held on June 9th. |
Matthew was diagnosed with Birkitt’s lymphoma when he was five years old. As of June, he has been cancer free for eighteen months. In September, he will begin third grade. I spoke with Matthew and his parents, Tracy and Eric.
Logan was diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, called Langerhans cell histiocytosis, when he was two and a half years old. In September, Logan will start kindergarten. I spoke with Logan’s mom, Trish.
Issues facing families when children have cancer
Tracy:
We realized that we were not the only family. We met other families who were
in way worse shape than us, with the care of their children. Even though your
child has cancer and has lost feeling in his foot, there are other families who
have lost their child. And now they are angels. Children are innocent. They shouldn’t be fighting these horrible diseases, and
they shouldn’t be getting adult drugs.
Eric: We need more focus on pediatric cancers. The kids are getting left behind.
Tracy:
they only get four percent of the money that is raised. You want cancer to be gone, but it seems like they are treating cancer backwards. They should start treating
cancers with the kids because we have to figure out why they are getting them.
They didn’t smoke, and they didn’t drink. They need to find what works for kids.
Trish: My son was two and a half when he started complaining of back pain. We took Logan to the pediatrician. The doctor ordered X ray. They looked at the X ray and said that there is something not right here. We had an MRI done. It was a long day in the hospital. At two and a half years, he had to be sedated. Various people came in, including a hematologist-oncologist. After a biopsy, they found it is was a form of histiocytosis, called Langerhans cell histiocytosis or LCH. One in 200,000 children are diagnosed with this. It is a fairly rare type of cancer. He did steroids and chemotherapy for a year to treat it. It was done at different intervals and went pretty smooth. There isn’t much funding for this.
They use adult drugs for pediatric cancer. There is no research and funding to look
for other treatments for kids. When an adult gets these drugs, they don’t live
long enough to know what other functions are affected. With a kid, they don’t
know the long-term repercussions. They need additional research.
Health, hope, and challenges
Tracy: Matthew is in remission. We had an 18 month goal. His type of
cancer has a high rate of recurrence within that time frame, so that was our
first goal, to make it that far. We do weekly infusions.
Eric:
His immune system has not recovered. He gets weekly injections to boost his
immune system.
Tracy:
There are always germs. When we first sent Matthew back to school after treatment, he
missed twenty days out of forty days. So that’s when we started
the weekly injections, and that has helped keep his immune system to a fairly
normal level, so he fights colds like a normal kid. What would happen before was
one kid would get a runny nose or a cold but Matthew would end up with the flu
because his immune system was not there.
We are more perceptive of stuff now; other stuff doesn’t really matter.
Tracy: We try to appreciate our family time together
Eric: It opens your eyes. We were that close to losing him so it makes you think.
Financially, it’s a burden. Tracy no longer worked full time because she had to
take care of Matthew. You have to cut back on stuff. It
totally changes. We had to rip out the rugs. They are a germ factory. We had to throw out plants because they have mold. All of the stuff you took for granted, you no longer take for granted.
Trish: Logan does pretty good. He starts
kindergarten in the fall. He is a remarkable
kid. When he complained about back pain, he just said my back hurts and pointed
to it. Typically, with this type of disease, there is a lot of pain. We figured that he had a high tolerance for pain. He never complained about earaches, sore throats, etc.
Activities for young cancer survivors
Matthew:
Golf is really fun. I can get outside and smell the fresh air. I can hit pretty
far. I like to get the ball in the cup. That’s my favorite sport.
because of his dropfoot. Baseball, hockey, physically active running sports are activities we
are trying to stay away from until we know that his leg is getting better and
getting healed. Golf isn’t that exertive on the leg. Matthew likes swimming but we don’t have our own
pool. We will get one one day.
It's tough for parents to see their child going through so much. I wish more power to the parents and lots of blessings to the little boy who is this brave.
Thank you for sharing their journey. I wish them lots of strength and love
It's heart breaking to read this. May God give them strength and power to face this challenge peacefully !!!
It's lovely you have featured this family on your blog. It must be so hard for parents whose kids are struggling with cancer or any other illness. Hope they are able to withstand the struggles and come out stronger on the other side