Heroes - Round 2

Zowie Kile was born January 8th, 2004. When she was two years old, she was short on breath and kept complaining about leg pain. When the doctors performed a leukemia test, it was confirmed in minutes. Usually they take no less than a half an hour to confirm. On January 10, 2007, Zowie began her first battle with cancer. But soon, on February 18 of the same year, Zowie was declared cancer free. Her family moved to Missouri and she began to attend preschool. A year and three weeks later, Zowie was rushed to the hospital in an ambulance to begin her second battle with cancer. Months were spent at a hospital in Tennessee, saving Zowie's life. On December 23rd, 2009, Zowie received the best Christmas present she could have. Zowie was given new bone marrow. The transplant went successfully and she was declared cancer free on April 2 of this year. Then, just a few months later on September 7th, Zowie relapsed for a third time. Now Zowie is again fighting for her life. In her case, the third time isn't the charm, as the cancer has come back over twice as effective as the first relapse. Her family says they are just thankful for every day they get with her.

Taylor Nicole Love entered this world on June 27th, 2005. She was a beautiful, blue eyes, blond haired, cheerful girl. When she was 18 months old, on December 12, '06, Taylor was hospitalized and diagnosed with Stage IV Neuroblastoma. Since her diagnosis Taylor has endured countless procedures, biopsies, blood transfusions and stays in the hospital. She has undergone 7 rounds of high dose chemotherapy, a surgery to remove a tumor in her abdomen and a stem cell harvest. She has completed several rounds of a phase I clinical trial which included immunotherapy treatment and IV radiation. She had undergone radiation treatments to her head, orbits and abdomen and is currently undergoing treatment in a phase II antibody trial at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in NYC.
This year, Taylor was diagnosed with a second cancer, Chemo-Induced Leukemia. In August she had a dangerous but successful bone marrow transplant, and is now home and healing. She is doing wonderfully, as good as she's felt in years. We love you Tay!

Look at the little kids I've posted about. I call them heroes. They go through so much more than we know. And that's just the beginning.

Every 3 1/2 minutes a child is diagnosed with cancer.

Every 4 hours a child with cancer dies.

Yes. Every four hours.

About one in 300 boys and one in 333 girls will develop cancer before the age of 20.

Currently there are approximately 40,000 children undergoing cancer treatment in the US.

Only 13% of those children are likely to survive.

40,000. I've only introduced you to five.

Childhood cancer receives less than 3% of government cancer research funding. Breast Cancer gets almost 85% of the funds.

For every 6 research dollars per patient with AIDS, a child with cancer receives 30 cents.

September is Childhood Cancer Awareness Month, which nationally goes unrecognized.

I don't understand why we can't do more.

Help us fight for the cure.

Make a donation if you can, please. Every dollar makes a difference. I can tell you honestly.

Erika

Taylorlove.org

http://laylagrace.org

Heros - Round 1

This is Layla Grace. She was born November 26, 2007. In May of 2009, Layla was diagnosed with Stage IV Neuroblastoma. Treatment started right away. Over the space of 10 months, Layla underwent 7 rounds of chemotherapy, 11 surgeries, multiple blood transfusions, a bone marrow harvest and transplant, radiation, and lengthy hospital stays. After fervent prayers and too many close calls, Layla was announced cancer free. Then, on January 22 of this year, Layla relapsed for the first time. Despite the work of the doctors and the many prayers sent up in Layla's behalf, Layla earned her eternal wings and joined heaven's army on March 9th of this year. Today would be her 3rd birthday. We love and miss you Layla, xoxo.

The day after Layla died, four year old Angelina Dorsagno was diagnosed with the same form of cancer. Doctors found that the cancer had already metastasized, invading a majority of Lena’s tiny body. There were tumors in Lena’s brain, bones, spine, face, shoulder, femur, hips, and abdomen. Her family was informed that she needed to start chemo that very day.
Since March 10th, Lena has undergone six rounds of chemo and surgery to remove a large part of her main tumor. She has spent countless weeks in the hospital, away from her father, Brian, and his fiancé, Lisa, her stepfather, Matt and her four older siblings, Geno, Bella, Mia and Mya.
On September 7, the same day she was supposed to start Pre-K, Lena started the most intense part of her treatment, an autologous stem cell transplant with high dose chemo. Currently, she is on day three of the high dose chemotherapy. These high doses also carry high risks, but Lena and her family are keeping their faith.

You know that tight feeling in your chest after running a mile? That pressure that makes it hard to breath – the brick sitting there, warning you that it’s time to stop? Imagine, if you will not being able to ever catch your breath. Imagine something inside of you competing for the very breath you’re struggling to take. And now, imagine enduring this at only 6 months old.

March 4, 2009 Jaxon Kyle Wallace was born. He was a fighter from day one. Born six weeks early, the cards were already stacked against him, but Jaxon didn’t let that deter him. He learned to eat like a champ and went home after ten days in the NICU.

At Jaxon’s four-month check-up he was congested and coughing, but after medications and the regular use of a humidifier, his symptoms cleared up. Jaxon’s mom, Heather, noticed that although he was feeling better his breathing wasn't stable and very noisy. So at his six-month check-up she revisited the issue with Jaxon’s pediatrician. The doctor decided to do a chest x-ray – just to be safe.

What the x-ray revealed was a large tumor attached to the back of Jaxon’s right lung. When laid on his stomach, the tumor fell into his lung, putting pressure on his airway and causing the breathing that concerned Heather. Further testing showed that the tumor had also began to invade Jaxon’s spinal cavity, causing compression to his spinal cord.

At six months old, Jaxon had poison pumping through his veins. Chemotherapy that would make him nauseous, weak, and very sick. But don’t forget, Jaxon was born a fighter. And along with his parents, Heather and Kyle, and the doctors at Texas Children’s Hospital, an army was formed to fight the cancer trespassing in his little body. On September 8, 2009, Jaxon was officially diagnosed with Stage II Neuroblastoma.

Jaxon didn’t seem to notice that he was in the hospital. He took in his surroundings with innocent, wide-eyed curiosity, earning the name “The Little Observer” from his nurses and doctors. During his first two weeks at the hospital, Jaxon rolled over for the first time. This would be one of many tiny victories he would make throughout his treatment.

In June of this year, Jaxon was known as the little survivor. <3


Help us find a cure.

Erika

Thanksgiving

is today. I swear yesterday it was still October. This month has gone by WAAYY too fast. But anyways, happy Thanksgiving.

I can tell yah what I'm thankful for. I'm thankful for a warm house, a shelter. I'm thankful for my family that loves me. My friends. The rain. And sometimes, heaven forbid, even the snow. I'm forever grateful for music. Country music. Sugarland. Reba. All those guys =) I'm thankful for cute guys. What would our world be without them. I'm grateful for all the moments I can't remember that make me smile. I'm thankful for Brit, Caroline, Taylor, Faith, Kat, Ansley. Holly. Holly I owe a lot to. A lot of thanks. She's quite spectacular =) And Vivian. I owe her a lot of thanks for all the concerts we went to together last summer. I'm thankful for my phone. I'm thankful for laughter. Smiles. Tears. Christmas. Christmas decorations. Lyrics. Poetry. Challenges. I'm thankful for the Love family. <3

And whoever is reading this, I love you too.

I'm thankful for you.

Xoxo

Erika

Special Girls

We will start this post off with a video. Or shall I say a link to a video. A link to a video done by a very, very, very, very special friend of mine.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgknSYq0yNs

This is kind of a two part post. First, let me tell you about Holly. Holly is the girl is the video. I started following her videos on Youtube a while back. She is an amazing country singer with so much potential that I'm certain that she'll be performing all over the country someday. She's a sweet, sweet girl who cares about others wholeheartedly. She's been so sweet to me and I've tried to support her in anyway I can. I love her a lot. If you like her videos, check out http://jennifernettlesnumb1fan.tumblr.com/ or http://hollylawsonfan.webs.com/. She is selling a cover CD for $8 if anyone is interested.
Anyways, she's quite a spectacular girl.

Now, onto the point of that video up there. I asked Holly to do a video for 10 year old Ansley a while ago. Ansley was diagnosed with a form of lung cancer at the beginning of this month. Ansley has been following Holly's videos with me for a while so I knew it'd mean the world to her if Holly would do a song for her on her Youtube account. When I was chatting with Holly one day I asked her if she would do it. A few days later, the video was up on Youtube. She even was kind enough to do Ansley's favorite song. I couldn't believe it for a while. This is a little girl Holly hadn't even heard of until I asked her to do it. She's never met her, never seen a picture of her, anything.

After the video was posted, I went over the the hospital to check on Ans and to show her the video. When I got there, Ans was crying because she was sooo sick and in so much pain. She barely had enough strength to give me a hug when I came in. The doctors came in and gave her some medication and stuff, but she was still in so much pain she couldn't stop crying. I decided to show her the video to try to cheer her up. I started talking to her about the video before I got it up, saying that Holly had done a video just for her. She was shocked. It was soo cute. When I got the video up, she immediately stopped crying. We watched the video, her smile growing until it reached ear to ear.

I received a letter from Ans & her mom today. Her mom told me about her progress, the chemotherapy and stuff like that. Enclosed in the letter was also a little thank you note that Ansley had written. She was so grateful for the video, saying how special she felt that it was a video just for her. <3

We need more special people like Holly in the world. That will make a difference with their talents.

I love you Holly.

I love you Ansley.

Xoxo
Erika

This Way to Wonderland...

I am actually, surprisingly, kind of really depressed that rehearsals and performances for the school play of "Alice in Wonderland" are over. You work at something so hard for almost 3 months and then, all of the sudden, it's just over. It's been so much fun. I've made so many new friends and have gotten to know them well. I will for sure miss this experience but I'm glad I was a part of it. I hope next year the new music director will pick a good play and good people to be in it, hopefully one of those good persons is me. ;) Thanks to all those who came to the performances, I hope you enjoyed the show as much as the cast enjoyed putting it on for you. Special thank you's to all the parents who helped out and especially to Mrs. Christensen for all the work and effort she put into this wonderful production. Thank you to the cast who worked so hard and made this such an enjoyable experience! I love you all so very much!

Thursday night was a pretty emotional night for me. 2 of my friends were going to come to the Wednesday dress rehearsal of "Alice in Wonderland" because they couldn't come to the actual show, and both ended up not being able to come Wednesday. Then, for whatever reason I'm not sure of, both of them showed up Thursday. Neither told me they were coming. I was just casually dancing onstage and saw them sitting in the audience. My mind went totally blank and I messed up on my dancing pretty badly but I recovered moderately well. It was so much fun to see them there. I was ecstatic. In between those times when I wasn't onstage I was in the drama room trying to hold back tears. I still can't believe they showed up just for me. Anyways, that was a pretty fantastic night.

Now that that's out of the way... 26 days until my birthday! Might as well start the countdown early. I'm anxious. I want to be 13. Ha, ha. Which that also means Christmas is coming up soon. I already have some of my Christmas shopping done =) You know those sales, can't miss 'em. Ha, ha. I got a special friend of mine a really beautiful angel necklace because she is such an angel to me. I hope she's not reading this post, ha, ha, that'd be bad. I can't wait to give it to her =)

I'm starting to hate the UPS guys. I won a signed Sugarland picture a few weeks ago and they said they shipped it like a month ago and it still hasn't come. Also, I'm waiting for some barrettes for a few friends of mine from Stef and they still haven't come either! I'm ticked! Hope they come soon.

I wrote a new song recently. It's been a while since I've done any writing. The song is called "Little Hands", and I recorded it so it's all amazing and everything. It's kind of a story song. From my perspective, it's a single mother writing about her child. Each verse is a different period in that child's life time. And the chorus talks about how she's doing all she can to support this child and how she wants to raise her child to be a strong girl. It's one of my favorite songs that I've written. I also wrote another one called "Promise Me", which I actually wrote kind of about one of my friends. It's kind of a song saying that when I'm going through my trials, I'll stand as strong as I can on my own but I need you to promise me that when I'll fall you'll be there. That song is a pretty emotional one for me. I love the lyrics. I will have to post them sometime.

Ok. I'm done blabbering now. Thank you for reading this post. I love you. Ha, ha =)

Erika

Two weeks of November behind us.. here comes the Chirstmas decorations.

Well. The tree is almost up. And the village is coming soon. Not to mention the outside lights. And that giant snow globe. Happy Thanksgiving everyone. Ha, ha =)

IF ANYONE WOULD LIKE TO COME to the school play of Alice in Wonderland TONIGHT and TOMORROW at 7:00, I would definitely appreciate it. I love you guys =) Ha, ha, but I would love you more if you would come ;) I am in it, for those that don't know....

Which is why this is going to be a short blog post. Call time!

Love you!!

Erika

P.S. - Watch this. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LgknSYq0yNs