The Fight of Her Life

Mia was 7 years old, with long chestnut brown hair and a smile like a light, when the ambulance brought her to the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia.

It was November 28, 2005. The week before had been Thanksgiving with her family, her loving parents, her two little brothers, James and Sage, and her best friend — her dog CiCi. Now she was on a stretcher, being admitted into intensive care. The diagnosis was devastating. She had acute myeloid leukemia (AML). This rare form of leukemia affects only 500 children a year. The cancer was attacking Mia's blood and bone marrow.

Thus began the fight of her life.

She wasn’t alone. For children and families facing pediatric cancer, there is no brighter beacon of hope than Children’s Hospital. The Cancer Center at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia cares for more children with cancer than any other general pediatric hospital in the nation. And the researchers here are tirelessly searching for a cure.

Mia would miss two years of school, two years of childhood. The Hospital would become a home. Child Life specialists would play with her and give her lessons to keep her education up to date. Nurses cared for her like family. Doctors used the best medicine available. Her brothers and friends would visit and play. Her grandpa would visit too, always bringing her the orange cream-pops that she loves.

Mia endured every challenge, every elation and every disappointment that cancer treatment brings. She has lost her hair, her eyelashes, but never her spirit.

She survived brutal rounds of chemotherapy, going into remission only to relapse. She has undergone two bone marrow transplants. Her 18-month-old brother, James, was her donor, making him the youngest sibling stem-cell transplant in Children's Hospital’s history. She calls him her angel.

She worries about her white cells. She worries about her red cells. She worries about her platelets. She worries about her monocrytes. She worries about how she looks. She worries about her odds.

But today, Mia is still with us. Today, her counts are good. Today, she can go to the movies. Today, she has her childhood back.