As I heard the smoke
detector beep upstairs, signaling a low battery, I couldn’t help but feel a
little sad. Mason would always help my dad change the batteries in our smoke
detectors whenever their batteries were low. Even sitting here writing, I can
hear the far too frequent beep of the thing, and I keep wishing that Mason was
home to change it.
I spent basically all of
today with him, scratching his back and his chest. After stopping chemo, a
couple of his lymph nodes became a little swollen. The doctors thought this
might be due to an infection, so they wanted to see if an antibiotic would help
that swelling. Turns out this antibiotic caused a bit of a reaction giving
Mason yet another itchy rash all over, which led to my daylong scratching. The
doctors, however, think that it's an after effect of the chemo. My mom and I
think this rash is a totally new and different one due to an allergic reaction,
but I guess we’ll have to wait and see.
Today we also tried dyeing
his Mohawk orange. We shaved his head, as you know, but my dad gave him a short
little Mohawk. As it turns out, his scalp absorbed more orange than his really
short hair did, but I still think it looks good.
In other news, some people
have been raising money in support of Mason and leukemia. They have come to me,
Mason’s liaison, and asked where that money should go. On discovering Mason’s
blood type was B+, I told him that the perfect place to donate the money to
would be The B+ Foundation. This foundation is in honor of the 14-year old boy,
Andrew McDonough, with B+ blood as well, who bravely battled leukemia and
sepsis until July of 2007 when he passed away. This foundation spreads the
message to “be positive,” while also raising money for childhood cancer
research and money for families that need financial assistance during their
battles with childhood cancer. The McDonough family story has truly been an
inspiration to me, and the foundation is truly remarkable.
Later today, I got a text
from a grade school friend of mine, AJ. He told me that for the first time
ever, the Salesianum School (plus their sister schools) are having a THON. For
those of you who don’t know, THON is an all night dance party that raises money
for childhood cancer, and it was started by students at Penn State. Since then,
many schools have mimicked the motion and done “mini THONS.” On March 16, 2013,
Salesianum will be one of those schools. When AJ texted me and told me this, he
mentioned that all of the money raised would be donated to The B+ Foundation.
Can you guess who went to Salesianum? Andrew McDonough.
The coincidences are
insane! For the first year ever, Salesianum decided to have a THON and to
donate the money to the foundation for childhood cancer. This same year, my
brother was diagnosed with one of those childhood cancers. This same year, my
brother decided that after having the same blood type as Andrew, he would
donate to the foundation started in honor of him. Freaky.
So AJ told me that their
goal is to raise $46,000 in honor of the 46 kids diagnosed with cancer each
day. Since my baby brother was one of those 46 on February 1, 2013, AJ felt the
need to tell me about it. He told me their goals and mentioned that he had been
in contact with Joe McDonough, the father of Andrew and founder of B+, without
knowing that I had also been in contact with him. They have a website being run
by the B+ Foundation that has a thermometer on it tracking their progress in
donations. As you are allowed to make teams to donate money in honor of, I will
be making one for Mason at some point soon. I want Team Orange to be a part of the $46,000 that I
know AJ and all of the THON participants this year will raise for the B+ Foundation. Their
website is https://www.beposfdn.org/Sallies2013/EventLandingPage.aspx.
All of the donations in
Mason’s name are yet another example of the support and love that has been
shown for Mason and our family. I don’t have words for how appreciative my
family and I feel. There are no words to describe how thankful we are to have
all of you in our lives, and the positive energy boosts Mason’s spirits in the most
amazing way. Thank you for everything that each one of you has done for Mason
and our family. He’s always positive, and we owe a lot of that to all of you.
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