In March 2008, at age 10, Alex was diagnosed with a medulloblastoma brain tumor. She had surgery to remove the tumor and has already completed radiation therapy; her next step is chemotherapy at Children’s Hospital.

Alex is a wonderful sister to our three other girls, ages 9, 6, and 2, Alex is a great friend and true inspiration to all of us.

On February 27th Jeff and I took Alex for an appointment to a neurologist. We had noticed that her handwriting had become shaky and that she was having some slight balance problems. After a physical exam the doctor asked us to go and have a MRI done to check and see if there were any problems internally. We took her to Children’s, completed the MRI and came home that night. Early the next morning, we received a phone call early requesting that we return to Children’s for another MRI. So, off we go again not expecting to hear the bad news that Alex had a brain tumor and would need to stay in the hospital and have surgery early Monday morning. We were shocked! The tumor is called a medulloblastoma, it is cancer but it is very treatable with a combination of surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. She made it through the surgery very well and was able to come home 5 days after the surgery. She then spent one month recuperating before starting radiation. Radiation was for 6 weeks - 30 days and it was very hard on her. We are so proud of her for completing radiation, it was tough!

Her next line of treatment is chemotherapy. It will start on June 26th at Children’s Hospital in DC and will be for four months. The course is a high dose chemo with stem cell rescue every 28 days; this means she will be in the hospital receiving treatment for 6 days and then come home to recover until the next one starts again.

Her last chemo will be in mid September and as soon as she feels better she will be joining her friends at middle school.

Before that begins, Alex is preparing for the end of the year activities as a 5th grader and hoping to go to the beach for a week as soon as her sisters finish school. Please keep Alex in your prayers; we know that this summer will be a hard one for her. Thank you to everyone who has helped us by bringing meals, cards and presents for Alex, visiting us in the hospital, organized play dates for the other girls, and opened your heart to our family. We can never tell you how much we appreciate all of the love and support that has been given to us. It is what gives us the power to keep on going with a smile on our face every day. Please sign Alex’s guestbook, she loves to read the messages and it is very inspirational.

Lisa