Zeke's journey
Donation protected
April 5th 2017.
Our shooting star, Zeke, was born. Our fairytale soon took an unexpected turn when Zeke was rushed to NICU (Neonatal intensive care unit) The first week of Zeke's life was unforgettable, but not in the way most parents experience their newborns first week of life. We had countless sleepless nights, not only from caring for a newborn but from worry, we saw our son endure more tests and scans in his first week than most people will have their entire childhood lives.
After a long and nervous wait, one week later we heard news. We were shown into an office where we met the ward co-ordinators and three ladies we hadn't met before. We were told what the mass was...Cancer.
Not benign but malignant cancer. How? In a newborn? Are you sure the results are right? Our world, our hearts and time itself stood still in that office. We could see them talking but they weren't saying anything.That afternoon is a fog, a distant memory, a blur. We now knew what we were looking at, we now knew though we wish we didn't.
Our newborn baby had the unthinkable... Zeke had cancer.
Zeke was diagnosed with PNET (Primitive Neurological Ectodermal Tumor).
Only 13 cases world wide of this cancer in newborn has been documented, Zeke being the 14. The oncologists were more concerned for Zeke's treatment than the cancer itself. How was a newborn baby going to be able to survive the extensive and intense chemotherapy regime this aggressive cancer demands?
6 cycles of chemotherapy, surgery and then a further 11 cycles of chemotherapy.
It was a risk we needed to take to cure our baby, Zeke.
We buckled in, held hands and prepared for the hard fight ahead.
Our shooting star, Zeke, was born. Our fairytale soon took an unexpected turn when Zeke was rushed to NICU (Neonatal intensive care unit) The first week of Zeke's life was unforgettable, but not in the way most parents experience their newborns first week of life. We had countless sleepless nights, not only from caring for a newborn but from worry, we saw our son endure more tests and scans in his first week than most people will have their entire childhood lives.
After a long and nervous wait, one week later we heard news. We were shown into an office where we met the ward co-ordinators and three ladies we hadn't met before. We were told what the mass was...Cancer.
Not benign but malignant cancer. How? In a newborn? Are you sure the results are right? Our world, our hearts and time itself stood still in that office. We could see them talking but they weren't saying anything.That afternoon is a fog, a distant memory, a blur. We now knew what we were looking at, we now knew though we wish we didn't.
Our newborn baby had the unthinkable... Zeke had cancer.
Zeke was diagnosed with PNET (Primitive Neurological Ectodermal Tumor).
Only 13 cases world wide of this cancer in newborn has been documented, Zeke being the 14. The oncologists were more concerned for Zeke's treatment than the cancer itself. How was a newborn baby going to be able to survive the extensive and intense chemotherapy regime this aggressive cancer demands?
6 cycles of chemotherapy, surgery and then a further 11 cycles of chemotherapy.
It was a risk we needed to take to cure our baby, Zeke.
We buckled in, held hands and prepared for the hard fight ahead.
Organizer
Amy Greenwood
Organizer
Yanchep WA
