ELIJAH BEATS CANCER

One day, three year old Elijah Cole Maurer dropped a toy on his foot. It hurt. But then it kept hurting the next day. And the next day. That’s when he noticed the bump on his foot. At first, his parents, thought it was just a broken bone. The next day, they took Elijah to his pediatrician to run some tests, followed by a visit to their orthopedist. The orthopedist ordered more scans, MRI’s, ultrasounds, blood tests, and other exams to pinpoint the problem. Something looked wrong with the scan results. So, a week and a half later, Elijah was taken into Randall’s Children’s Hospital for a biopsy.

He received his diagnosis on March 31, 2014.

But it was not a broken foot. Not even close.

Elijah was diagnosed with Ewing’s Sarcoma, a rare and highly aggressive bone cancer.

According to cancer.gov, Ewing’s occurs in only three cases per million per year, with an even smaller likelihood of affecting children under the age of five.

“[When we found out], it was very terrifying, to say the least. Ewing’s is not one that you want. [There aren’t] really a lot of options…If the first course of options doesn’t work, there are only a few choices left. And after that, there’s just not really much you can do,” said Elijah’s mom, Crissy Maurer.

The diagnosis hit the family hard. But that was not the only thing the Maurers were faced with that day.

The day Elijah received his diagnosis, the Maurers had also just received the key to their new house in Hillsboro. They were now faced with the news about Elijah’s health, moving into a new house and transferring schools for their other three sons.

A huge financial challenge lay before them.

Before his treatment began, a family friend had set up a donation website for Elijah, in which they raised about $5,000.

“Just from moving, Chris [Elijah’s father], taking time off work, then five trips a week to the hospital, we went through all of that money in less than a week,” Crissy Maurer said.

For the entire week after Elijah’s diagnosis, doctors ran more tests to confirm that this was the only cancer in his body. Despite the 25% chance of the cancer spreading to other parts of his body, the only cancer discovered remained in his foot. Now their task was to destroy every last cancer cell left so it did not return.

Chemotherapy is a critical part for the treatment of Ewing’s Sarcoma. It uses drugs to prevent the growth of cancer cells, either by killing the cells or by stopping them from dividing.

“It’s all just luck whether or not your kid is going to respond to treatment. If it doesn’t, well… you just won’t have your kid for very long,” Crissy said.

Elijah’s first phase of chemotherapy lasted for over 12 weeks, from the beginning of April to the end of July. An aggressive form of treatment, chemotherapy knocked down Elijah’s neutrophil counts to almost zero, meaning he became too weak to fight anything.

“For every two weeks, he had about 4-5 days where his [blood] counts were just horrible and he couldn’t go anywhere,” Elijah’s mom added.

Days when his blood counts were normal were spent outside of the house. The family used this time to eat out at restaurants or run errands they did not have a chance to do before.

Following the first phase of chemo, Elijah had to undergo a partial foot amputation to remove the tumor. His big toe and two bones below it were amputated. But despite a predicted “two-week” recovery process, Elijah was up and walking within three days of surgery.

“He doesn’t like to be held down. And when he is watching all of his brothers playing, it’s hard not to be playing himself,” his mother said.

However, even though the cancerous tumor had now been removed, Elijah’s chemotherapy continued for another 20-21 weeks to eradicate the microscopic cells that could have remained after surgery. Elijah started chemo again in August and received his final chemo on Jan. 31.

About a week later, the Maurers received the news they had been longing to hear.

After running full-body scans, doctors confirmed that Elijah was cancer-free on Feb. 10, almost a year after his diagnosis.

Elijah’s recovery process would not have been as successful without the love and support of his three brothers: Bryce (8), Austin (7) and Liam (3). When Elijah had lost all his hair because of the cancer, the boys and their dad showed their support by shaving their heads.

Elijah is ecstatic that his “cancer is all gone!” Not only has his own hair started to grow back, but now that he is doing better, he wants to start playing basketball. On Valentine’s Day, Crissy Maurer surprised the family with a three-month old rescue puppy, Drexler Maurer. With continued support from his family and puppy, Elijah’s health is continuing to improve.

Elijah and his family extend their thanks to the Glencoe and Evergreen communities for the help and prayers they gave.

According to Layton Fishback, Glencoe’s sparrow club adviser, Glencoe and Evergreen raised over $10,090 for the Maurers.

“[They are] a special family that allows an entire school to come alongside them and be a part of their life during such a challenging time. This family not only let Glencoe into their lives, but shared their lives and journey very openly with us. As much as we tried to serve them, they really were the ones serving us,” Fishback said.

#eljah #Issue31415