Battling Cancer With, Zachariah!

Every parents nightmare.... When a diagnosis like this is given to a small child it is the worst, because they do not fully undersand what is really happening. All Zachariah knows is that he can not go back to school and play with his friends until he gets better. He does not know the word "cancer". He only knows that the boo boo on his neck is bad, and that is the reason he is in the hospital. He is being told that the Drs, and nurses are trying to help him get better so that he can eventually go back to school, and play with his friends again. For us as Zachs family we know this... On November 17th Zachariah was diagnosed with Burkitts lymphoma. He is 6 years old. It all started back in mid September when he had a swollen lymph node on the right side of his neck. He was taken to his pediatricain to have it checked out. It turned out that Zachariah tested positive for mono. Usually with mono, and other infections, lymph nodes can swell up and go back to normal after a few weeks. In Zachs case, his lymph nodes stayed the same. After two different rounds of antbiotics, it was clear that a biospy was needed especially after his lymph node grew even bigger with in one week after he stopped his last course of antibiotic. He was taken to the hospital to have a biospy done, and a few days later they called with the worst news any parent can ever get. Zachariahs Mother and Father were informed that they needed to bring him as soon as possible to have him admited. The pathologist found a very aggressive type of cancer that spreads so fast, that with in weeks it can spread all over the body.Once Zachariah arrived at the hospital multiple tests were performed. It took almost 5 days to figure out what stage he was in. The Oncologists found two other masses. One located near his kidney, and the other near his pancreas. Zachariah had to have several procedures done to take samples of his bone tissue to check if cancer had spread into there as well. Luckily it did not. He was listed as having stage 3. A few days later a port was put into his chest. He was given his first round of chemo on November 21st. Luckily he was released right before Thanksgiving. Once he was home he had to continue to take all of his meds.On November 28th Zachariah had to return to the hospital to be checked out by his Dr. Unfortunetely the tumor on his neck did not change in size as expected. It actually looked a little bigger. This was not the news that everyone wanted to hear. This was an indication that this cancer was not responding to the chemo as expected. After a few hours later after another scan was performed it was determained by the Drs.that a new map had to be drawn out to try to gain control of this cancer within Zachs poor little body. Zachariahs parents were told that the other two masses had reduced in size, but the one that needed to go down the most was the one on his neck. Zachariah is now going through a harder round of chemo, and hopefully this will work better than his first one.This week he is at the hospital and is being treated by the doctors and nurses daily. Tomorrow morning he has to have another procedure. A spinal punture, that consists of more chemo being asministred into that area since it does not reach there through his port. This procedure will be done again on Sunday. His family has alot of faith, and remain hopeful that this new chemo plan will show the results that are needed to help save his life. Zachariah has two younger brothers at home who luckily do not know the severity of thier big brothers health because they are too young to understand. They are 4, and 2 years old. As of now, the chemo plan is predicted to be 6 to 8 months. In a few weeks the chemo will break down all of his cells in his body. The good, and bad ones. His hair will start to fall out in the next 2 weeks. His parents plan on shaving his head before that happens so that he will not get scared seeing it fall out slowly. No child should have to go through this. Something like this takes a toll on a family. Emotionally, financially, and in so many other ways you can not imagine, unless your going through it. Please pray for this Zachariah and our family. As it, will be a very long road.