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Ten-month-old girl faces bone marrow transplant
Bruce Matlock photo
Guy Holliday holds his 10-month-old daughter, Hanna. Hanna is battling cancer.
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Published: November 22, 2008
Ten-month-old Hanna Holliday squeals with delight as her father lifts her into the air and draws her close to his chest.
It's something Guy Holliday cherishes because for the first time in weeks, he's able to spend a little quality time with his baby without tubes, wires and worries.
"Today's a good day," Holliday said Friday. "She's home and everything's OK."
Guy and his wife, Kate, will take Hanna to Levine Children's Hospital in Charlotte Sunday to begin a rare procedure to give her a chance for a long, healthy life. She was diagnosed with acute megakaryoblastic leukemia (AML) in August.
Hanna wasn't quite 6 months old when Guy and Kate took her in for her well baby checkup.
After noticing the little girl looked a little pale, her doctor decided to perform a blood test.
"At 6:30 that night, she called us and said we needed to go to Levine's," Guy said.
There they got the devastating news — Hanna had cancer, and not only cancer, but a rare form, especially in infants.
Hanna has undergone eight bone marrow biopsies, four spinal taps and intervenors lines to pump necessary medication into her system.
Watching their baby endure so many invasive medical procedures has been tough, Guy said. "You feel so helpless when your child is laying there crying, screaming," he said.
Now, the Hollidays are preparing for the next stage of Hanna's treatment — a bone marrow transplant.
On Sunday, Hanna will go to Levine and be infused with fluids and chemotherapy medication to kill all of her bone marrow cells. Then, after a little more than a week, the bone marrow transplant, using cord blood, will begin.
Guy said there was no family match for bone marrow, so cord blood, taken from the umbilical cord of an infant, is the only choice.
This will be the first cord blood transplant at Levine, and the third bone marrow transplant.
Hanna will likely remain at Levine at least through Christmas, but a more realistic time frame for her return home is mid-January.
The procedure will be a costly one — around $400,00 — and the Hollidays' health insurance will not cover a majority of it.
"We've applied for grants and so forth and the hospital's helping us out," Guy said.
And others, complete strangers in most cases, are lending a hand.
For her birthday in October, Madison Clark asked friends to bring money for Hanna instead of presents, and her mother, Keisha Clark, is planning other fundraisers.
Others also stepped in.
Matthew Hicks showed up with a backhoe to help put in a new sewer line when the line backed up into the house just weeks after they bought it, and right after Hanna's diagnosis.
The Hollidays are also finding comfort through another parent with a child with leukemia, Nichol Lancaster. Lancaster's son, Josh, also has leukemia, although not the rare type afflicting Hanna.
"These people are actually getting off the couch and doing something," Guy said.
Their own experience led the Hollidays to start a program called Hanna's Heroes to help parents facing life-threatening illnesses with their children.
Through donations, Guy and Kate developed a care package of a gas card, roll of quarters, an age-appropriate toy, a blanket, an inflatable bed and hygiene products.
Kate said her husband's devotion to Hanna's Heroes is sometimes a little irritating.
"He drives me crazy with it sometimes. Sometimes I say just take out the trash," she said.
But doing something for others is Guy's therapy — a way to deal with his daughter's fragile health.
There are enough reminders of that, Guy said.
He can recite statistics about the rarity of his daughter's cancer, and how many children are affected by cancer nationwide, and how there's scant attention paid to childhood cancers in terms of research dollars.
The color pink, he said, is associated with the fight against breast cancer, but even the nurses working with his daughter didn't realize there is a color for childhood cancers — gold.
It's not the cancer statistics or the talk of bone marrow transplant that gets to him.
Seeing a simple ice cream freezer, one that prompts kids to beg their parents for a treat — that is a reminder.
"I saw the ice cream freezer and thought Hanna many never ask me for ice cream," he said.
The ordeal is difficult for 4-year-old Hailey, too. She can't be around her sister at home if she's sick and can't visit her in the hospital at all.
Before Hanna comes home from her transplant, Guy will transform one room in their home into what amounts to an isolation room to shield Hanna from germs. She won't be able to be out in public for a year.
Kate said she wonders about her daughter's future — her first day of school and other milestones — and knows having children of her own is not likely in Hanna's future.
But, for now, Guy and Kate, relish the ordinary moments.
"What's a bad day for most families is a good day for us," he said. "We're just glad she's here and she's home."
For more information, read Hanna's story at www.caringbridge.org/visithannaholliday or for Hanna's Heroes at www.hannasheroes.org.
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