Justin's Journey

Our favorite little friend just turned five and had a great birthday party with his family. Shortly after his birthday, Stacy and Geno took Justin to the doctor with an overabundance of bruising, fever, and sudden weight loss. Sadly the doctors reported that Justin will start a long fight with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (ALL).

ALL, is the most common form of leukemia found in children, accounting for about 30 percent of all pediatric cancer. Fortunately, ALL has one of the highest cure rates of all childhood cancers.

Acute lymphoblastic leukemia affects a type of white blood cell, called lymphocytes. The job of lymphocytes is to identify and destroy foreign proteins in the body, such as bacteria and viruses. In ALL, the bone marrow makes too many immature lymphocytes (called lymphoblasts) that do not mature correctly. Immature blood cells (blasts) do not have the ability to fight infection. The mutated lymphoblasts overproduce and crowd out normal cells in the bone marrow.

J-Man has started chemotherapy and various treatments and is doing well but has a long road ahead. Justin’s Journey starts with several intense months of treatment and will be followed up with two to three years of numerous doctor appointments and testing.

The good news is that Justin is one tough kid, has the greatest parents right by his side, and is getting the best treatment possible. Justin is getting tons of love and support from Andrew, Pam, Kara, Lauren, Scott, Cy, and his beautiful dance family. Erlene and I got to meet some of the nurses and staff and they are wonderful, talented people who truly care. They sure have their work cut out for them matching wits with Justin. It’s actually pretty entertaining.

Years of treatment will drive enormous hospital and medical bills. All of your generous donations will go directly to Stacy and Geno to help fill insurance gaps and countless expenses directly related to Justin’s Journey.

We love you Justin and we are all here for you.

We appreciate anything you can do to help this beautiful family.

Love,

Dan and Erlene