Save Joseph's life!

17/08/2022:

Joseph's condition is getting worse ... There are more and more metastases❗️ Help me in the fight for life!

Unfortunately, it is worse with Joseph...

3 cycles of chemistry that were supposed to help clean the marrow and bones of cancer cells, unfortunately did not help ...

3 weeks ago, we noticed a bruise on the eyelid of the right eye.  The fear of metastasis immediately appeared.  Within a few days, the eye swelled so much that Józio could see almost nothing through it ...

Doctors did a tomography of the head.  Our hearts broke into a million pieces when they said there was a tumor in the right eye socket and another one that was growing rapidly in the left eye socket!

We cannot believe it ... The metastases appeared during the administration of chemotherapy!  After all, in September Joseph was supposed to have high does chemotherapy and treatment with stem cells that had already been collected!  But the relapse forces us to change our plans ...

Ahead of us is another cycle of chemistry, this time stronger.  Doctors consult all the time, they are fighting for our son with all their strength.

The tumor in Joseph's chase turned out to be extremely malignant and prone to metastasis.  We do not know how much our son will be able to endure, because any chemotherapy has irreversible side effects for the body ... Now Joseph's hearing in one ear has deteriorated.

But that's not the end of the bad news ... It turns out that the scan in the left leg showed a terrifying image - a metastasis to the tibia that pushes the bone from the inside and can lead to a fracture!  After all, we know why Joseph did not want to stand on his feet for several days ... It must hurt him so much ...

We are still waiting for the detailed results of the research, but we are dying of nerves, as will be shown later.  How much more bad news can we take?  How long can our baby last?

We are desperate.  We stand by our brave little fighter.  We secretly cry our eyes out, fearing what the next day will bring ...

Joseph teaches us strength and perseverance, he smiles even now, although his leg hurts a lot.  Maybe it's better for him to be oblivious to this whole nightmare.  He fights bravely, but does not know that it is a fight to the death ...

We would do everything for Józio, and we can only be with him and believe that the treatment will bring results.  We ask for your support and we thank the people who show us so much heart and kindness in this most difficult time for us ...

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Our Little fighter, with beautiful  brown eyes and wonderful curly hair.... He just started his adventure called life and terrible fate is already trying to put an end to it!

Joseph was supposed to move  to Greece and  together with his parents they were planning to start a new life there. Unfortunately,  this did not happen... Just few days before planned flight abroad he started to feel unwell:  he was breathing heavily, like he is tired all the time. Visit at local GP did not show anything, but  did sent  Joseph to hospital suspecting that it is pneumonia. And that is when the hell began...

“First test blow us off of our feet  - enormous tumour in the middle of our sons chest, pushing onto his lungs and heart!”

This information seemed impossible, after all until now Joseph was perfectly healthy and happy! The Peace and our plans were immediately destroyed into pieces. After more tests were done, they confirmed the diagnosis and the doctors informed us that we are fighting with Neuroblastoma – aggressive tumour made of damaged cells of nervous system. It is one of the worst types of cancer, which is very common in little children!

With no time to waste Joseph was transported to Children’s Hospital in Krakow. That is where our battle begun! More and more test was done which show how tumour has spread in his little body. After biopsy , MIR and other procedures were performed we were told the full spectrum of the disease. It is stage IV neuroblastoma with amplification of the oncogene MYCN(+), metastases to the marrow and bones.   

This amplification means that the treatment will be much longer and more difficult... There is not time for careless fun, going for a walk outdoor, travelling or even planning his future. Instead our reality on daily basis is chemotherapy and hospital which is going to be Joseph’s home for next few months. We do not give up, because we believe that in this fight we will come out on top and standing tall!

The first effects of chemotherapy are promising – the tumour got smaller and it does not push so much on Joseph’s heart and lungs. Even with all the pain and fear that he feels all the time he is very brave and smiling more and more every day! This gives us all strength  to fight harder! We are hoping that all of this one day will be just a terrible memory of our past...

We are at the very beginning of very long and hard treatment, we have just finished 3 sessions of chemotherapy out of 8 that are planned. After that we expecting for a surgery to be performed and later on auto-transplant of a bone marrow, radiotherapy, immunotherapy  etc. The doctors said that because of Joseph’s young age he has pretty high chance to get completely cured  and we also believe this to be true.  

The last stage of the treatment, which gives Joseph the highest chances to get completely cured is a vaccine which is only available in New York. If Joseph could receive it, it could possibly prevent any future relapse of cancer, which unfortunately is very possible with Neuroblastoma. 

The cost of vaccine is extremely high – around 1 million PLN. This is the price that was put on Joseph’s life, this is the price we cannot afford. This is why we have decided to ask  for help all of you, so that we can succeed at the end of the day.  To make sure we manage to gather required amount of money, we start already. We do not know the final price, it can change during the fundraising.

Receiving the vaccine is possible up to 100 days from the time the treatment finished, therefore we are really hoping for help from all of you that care about the faith of Joseph! We thank you in advance from the bottom of our hearts!

 The parents of Joseph, Jakub & Annie