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‎Trigger warning. This is not for the faint of heart.http://google.com
‎This photo was taken about 10 weeks into treatment, when Simon was in the consolidation phase. This proved to be one of his toughest months. Not only did he have difficulty staying awake, but food became more of a challenge. Simon ended up back in the hospital with a side effect called mucositis. It’s straight up evil. Mucositis is a result of chemotherapy and causes canker-like sores throughout the ENTIRE digestive tract. It’s intensely painful, to the point where our sweet boy had to be on oxycodone just to help control the pain. At that same time, Simon started to show signs of severe liver distress, and had to be closely monitored for liver failure. Just a reminder, Simon’s form of leukemia is considered to be the most highly-treatable and “best case scenario” of all pediatric cancers.
‎This was far from best case scenario.
‎➡️ The LLS Children’s Initiative says the need is URGENT. Only FOUR cancer drugs have been approved as therapies specifically for children in 40 years, while HUNDREDS have been approved for adults. Children are not mini-adults and the one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work for children.
‎➡️ LLS is conducting an unprecedented collaboration to launch the first global precision medicine clinical trial for children with acute leukemia, called LLS PedAL. 
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