My Helping Hand

Baby Avery, Born Feb 21st, 2009

Avery's Story

Avery started with a small lump under her right ear about middle of September,2009. Her pediatrician treated it with antibiotics to see if it was an infection. A week later with no results, we were referred to a Pediatric Surgeon at Childrens. Dr. Langenburg felt it was a cluster of Lymp nodes reacting to an infection. He said give it a month or two to go away. If it gets bigger or does not go away come back. he did not want to biopsy it because it is the natural reaction of the lymp nodes to react. 2 weeks or so later, a mass started to grow on from the lump up to her cheek. We went back to the surgeon who ordered an MRI.
We needed a biopsy because they needed to pinpoint exactly what is causing this growth. The day of the biopsy, Dr. Stockton came out afterwards and told Shawn (Avery's father), and I that in his opinion, this is a malignant tumor. However, we need more results from the biopsy.

The Dr. called us and confirmed it was just what he suspected. The week of October 5th, 2009, we went to the oncologist and she explained that this is a rare tumor. It is Stage 4 non Rhabdomyosarcoma or a sarcoma. The location of the tumor prevents from surgically removing it so Avery will  need chemo and radiation first to shrink it. Radiation can cause disfigure her face because she is still growing and so young. THey also found lesions on her lung.

Avery's family is praying for no radiation, it depends on the chemo response.

View Avery's progress and Diaries @

http://www.myhelpinghand.org/diaries

More Information

For information on this disease, please visit the following links:

http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/soft-tissue-sarcoma

www.cancer.org