Courageous Kids like Kaleigh are so STRONG!!!
Kaleigh had found a lump behind her ear and a little down on her neck so her parents took her to a pediatrician who thought it was a swollen gland and prescribed antibiotics for two weeks to see if it would go down. It didn’t. So her family was then sent to a ear nose throat specialist who said it was a cyst, and nothing to worry about- saying they could get it removed if they wanted.
Her dad, Shawn went to schedule the surgery at local hospital and after surgery was over, they were told that it wasn’t a cyst and that it ended up being a mass further in her parodid gland and that the surgeon removed it and was confident that it wasn’t cancer but would be sent out to get checked at lab. Unfortunately, it came back as cancer. Shawn immediately sent it to UCSF children’s hospital for second opinion and it came back the same. Then they made a appointment at UCSF to get even more testing done. The scans came back that there was still more cancer in gland so they scheduled surgery to removed the gland from her facial nerve out and then it was sent to lab to check margins. Her dad says, “we were told that the cancer was within 3 mm of her facial nerve if it would have made it to nerve it would oh had to be removed and she would of been paralyzed on that side of her face. The surgery was very hard for us and her as she was already afraid of needles and she had never had a broken bone or cut or anything like this in the past.”
Her dad says Kaleigh has been very brave through her journey – especially will this all starting when she was only 11. The tests at the beginning also found spots in Kaleigh’s lungs that they have been monitoring but aren’t sure if there related yet, and she just had new scans recently and it found a 9 mm spot near surgical area but aren’t sure if its a lymph node or scar tissue or more cancer so monitoring that now too.
Shawn says, “During all this and our stays at hospital and family house she has seen all the kids of all ages that are also dealing with same things she is so she has collected over 250 teddy bears for kids going to appointments or scans or treatments or surgery. She has also collected art supplies and 125 Xmas coloring books and crayon sets for all the kids stockings for Xmas that are currently staying in the family house. She is a awesome kid and is never gonna give up!”
Click here to visit Kaleigh’s GoFundMe page!
WE NEGU FOR YOU KALEIGH!!! STAY STRONG SWEET GIRL!!!
