Friday, May 11, 2007

Honored Teammates


We have two honored teammates - Marganie Dumas and Jake Craig. Their parents provided the information about these special children and their current situations.

Jake Craig
Brandon, MS
Age: 19 months
Parents’ names: Jay and Megan Craig
Other family members: Jake is an only child besides our four-legged furry dog, Rankin
Type of Blood Related Cancer: ALL (Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia)
Date of diagnosis: 12/07/06

Favorite Activities:
Jake loves doing anything OUTSIDE!!! He loves to ride the tractor with his daddy and playing in the dirt. Jake also enjoys swimming- He started swim lessons at 5 months old!! He would stay outside all day if only his body wouldn’t tell him that he needs a nap!

Current treatment:
After our initial stay of two weeks in the hospital and beginning chemo, Jake went into remissino after just four weeks. This is only the beginning for Jake on this journey. We are currently treated in the outpatient wing of Blair E. Batson Children’s Hospital and will continue to receive chemo for at least the next 3 years.

How has the Society helped you personally?
The Society is due all the credit in the world for educating me on leukemia. I was absolutely clueless about this illness. I had heard of it but that was it. Thanks to all of the educational material we were given in the hospital I can actually understand the disease better. Also knowing the percentage increase of survival of children with ALL is great and we are currently in a study/research program for Jake's treatment. Hopefully we can keep raising those percentages to 100% survival rate!!! Also thanks for getting me into shape by joining Team In Training, it has been a great experience and I had SO MUCH FUN running 13.1 miles at the Country Music Half Marathon!!!


Marganie Dumas
Brandon, MS
5 years old
Parents’ names: Russ and Cindy Dumas
Siblings: Russell (15 years old), John Polk (9 years old), Camille (13 years old)
Type of Blood Related Cancer: Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia
Date of diagnosis: 01/23/07

Favorite Activities:
Playing with dolls, listening to Hannah Montana and the Cheetah Girls CDs, fishing and talking!!!!

Current treatment:
Marganie is currently in remission, but receives weekly treatments. She receives different types of chemotherapy depending upon the phase of her treatment. She recieves some IV push chemo, some IV infusions, some intrathecal shots and some IM shots.

How has the Society helped you personally?
The Society has made my family aware of the many ways that other families can be helped undergoing similiar circumstances. It has been simply amazing to my family the response of those around us to the need of contributions to the Society for further research and funding.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Awesome! Proud of you two. We'll be cheering you on, and contributing too, I'm sure! Love you both
Mom

Anonymous said...

Lindsey. . .If you can tolerate this guy on a day-to-day basis, 26 miles will be a breeze! Steve . . .If you are going to do this there will be no more lunches at CS's!
Best of luck to both of you and thanks for taking on such a wonderful task for two adorable kids (and the hundreds just like them). I'm also proud of you both and am grateful for the opportunity to contribute.