My sweet baby Aria’s journey officially started on April 23,2023, at the age of just five. For about 8 weeks before that date she suffered from a side pain that started with just a little discomfort then escalated to an unbearable pain that took away her ability to walk, she basically could not move without increasing the pain. Seeing my 5-year-old who before then had been perfectly fine, able to play, run, and walk, collapse to the floor in pain was horrifying. I had, over that time, taken her to her pediatrician twice and four different hospitals. CT scans, bloodwork, ultrasounds-and x-rays were all done, and no one could figure out what was wrong with her. I was told a pulled muscle, constipation and synovitis. I felt defeated.

On April 22nd at 11pm she spiked a fever and was in excruciating pain, and I decided to take her to Lehigh Valley Reilly Children’s Hospital. I bawled my eyes out the whole way there, I could just feel it in my gut that it was something bad. After getting called back to an exam room, a doctor came in to see her, and I couldn’t help but just cry and beg him to please help her. He was amazing. He reassured me that a lot of tests were already performed on her but there were so many more that could be done. At almost one in the morning, the doctor walked in, and I said, “Just tell me what it is.” He rolled up a chair, sat down, and said, “I am sorry, but she has cancer!” He showed me her blood work and explained that she had 12% blasts in her blood. He said that he would give me some time to call family and to calm down. I was distraught. I felt like I was in a nightmare and couldn’t wake up. Although I just knew I was going to be told she had something serious, I did not ever even have the thought of it being cancer!! How did my 5-year-old BABY have cancer??

Aria was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL), which is a blood cancer. Barely having an hour to process the devastating news, you’re being admitted to the hospital, meeting with multiple doctors, having test after test performed, and being scheduled for surgery. Just so much all at once. Trying to explain all this plus so much more to everyone, everything that you yourself didn’t quite understand yourself, was unimaginable. You’re then told that treatment for this cancer is 2 ½ to 3 years long! Just two days later I had to stand there helpless and watch the doctors roll her away in a hospital bed to the operating room to have a Port placed in her chest, a bone marrow biopsy, and to receive her very first spinal tap with chemo. Those results showed 97% of her body was cancer. While trying to process it all, I had the anxiety and stress of having to be away from my other three children who have never been away from me for more than one night. I had the fear of how I would explain her sickness to them.

We stayed at the hospital for 11 nights and were able to finally go home. Aria was miserable in the hospital. She cried so many times and begged me to take her home. All you want to do as a parent is fix everything and kiss and make the boo boos go away. I felt completely lost and a failure almost because I couldn’t do anything to make it better. We had to go to weekly appointments and have another biopsy after induction, which was the first phase of treatment. Her biopsy showed that she was MRD positive, which means leukemia was still detected. So, she was bumped from standard to high-risk treatment, which is more intense chemo and longer phases. My heart was broken all over again.

Aria had many ups and downs through frontline treatment. She had a seizure episode once; she had an anaphylaxis reaction to one chemo, which resulted in having to get 6 deep muscle injections into her thigh over two weeks, each time that one chemo was needed in treatment. Those injections were torture for her!! They were very painful. She has had multiple skin reactions from different chemos; she lost her hair 6 months after treatment started which was very hard for her; she missed most of her kindergarten year of school; and the list goes on. I believe she has had 8-10 different chemos so far. I can’t even tell you the number of spinals she has received. And through all of this she has remained so strong! She is a true inspiration. She wants so bad to find a way to help other children in similar situations. She still has over a year of treatment left, but I know that she will do amazing. She has had her innocence stolen so young and was forced to mature quicker than most kids, but she is a HERO. She will Inspire so many people. I am so thankful I was chosen to be her mom, and I am so very proud. Aria, you are my hero!

Writen by Aria’s mom, Amber

Please consider helping children with cancer and others in our community by scheduling a blood donation at Miller-Keystone Blood Center: https://donor.giveapint.org/donor/schedules/zip