Born: November 28, 1997
Illness: Pre-B Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia
Quilt Deadline: May 1, 2010
Theme of Quilt: Quilt is now full and closed. Please check the other children for stitching information.
The following interests are mainly to help you get to know the children better.
You may use what you can towards the theme of the quilt, but make sure that you stitch within the theme.
Brianna's interests are: She loves animals of all kinds, music, The Jonas Brothers, Polka dots, Down by the sea, Animal babies. Brianna lives in NY.
Click here to see the squares for Brianna as they come in for her! (Please keep in mind that her quilt was not opened to stitchers until October 2009)
Brianna is 11 years old and is the oldest of four children. She has led a very normal and healthy life up until January 2009. She came home from a sleep-over January 24, 2009 and had a little lump on her jaw line near her ear. I took her to her pediatrician that Monday and was told it was a swollen lymph node and that she probably had some sort of viral infection and that we should watch it for a week.
We returned the following week and noticed the lymph node had gotten bigger. We were sent for blood work to test for all kinds of things, including Mono, Cat Scratch Fever and Lymes. Everything came back normal. She was given anti-biotics for 10 days "just in case".
When we returned after the 10 days the lymph node had now gone from the size of a pea to the size of a walnut. The pediatrician did her blood work again, which all came back normal. She sent Brianna home with a different anti-biotic for 10 days. After the 10 days the lymph node had not decreased in size and we also noticed smaller lymph nodes in the neck. Brianna was also complaining of nausea, headaches and a lot of joint pain. She was not really eating and was having a hard time staying awake.
I took her to our local ER who suggested we visit our Pediatric Oncology Specialist to rule out Lymphoma, a cancer of the lymph nodes. Our Pediatrician thought this was absurd because she believed it was just a virus. She decided to send Brianna to an Infectious Disease Specialist, who also agreed it was probably a virus. He too did tons of blood work and did not know what was going on. After insisting to our Doctor that something more serious was wrong she sent us to a Ears, Nose and Throat Specialist, who I must add was WONDERFUL! He did a needle biopsy of the largest lymph node. A week later he told us Brianna may indeed have Lymphoma and he wanted her to go have one the of lymph nodes removed and tested. Brianna went in for surgery March 30th. We got the phone call the following morning confirming that she did have cancer.
We went to Albany Med's Pediatric Oncology Department Wednesday, April 1, 2009. Brianna had more blood work along with bone marrow biopsies from both hips. Friday morning, April 3, Brianna went in for surgery for her port to be put in for Chemo. She also received a spinal and was given Chemotherapy intrathecal that day. We found out that day, from the bone marrow, that she did NOT have Lymphoma but she has ALL. Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia.
