Nic: Neuroblastoma Survivor
If you’ve read my book, A Different Dream for My Child: Meditations for Parents of Critically or Chronically Ill Children, you know about Nic. He’s the young man who was diagnosed with neuroblastoma at age three. But if you don’t know Nic, let me introduce you to him and his medical condition.
What’s Neuroblastoma?
Neuroblastoma is the medical name for a type of childhood cancer that forms in the nerve cells. Nic’s cancer was quite advanced when it was diagnosed, and his treatment included chemotherapy and a bone marrow transplant. Thankfully, the disease went into remission for many years.
How’s Nic Doing Now?
When Nic was thirteen, more cancer was found in his thigh bone. It went into remission with chemotherapy. Since then, his life has been like any other teenager’s most of the time. Last year, he took driver’s education. He and his dad rebuilt the sweet little VW bug in the picture, and he recently got his license when he turned 16.
But some of the time, Nic’s life is not normal. He’s undergoing an experimental treatment that has take him to New York City and St. Jude’s hospital now and again. On my own, I have a hard time keeping track of Nic’s comings and goings. So I’m really glad Nic has a Caring Bridge web page where his family provides regular updates.
What’s Caring Bridge?
Caring Bridge is a free service provided to families going through medical treatment. Another site with a similar service is called Care Pages. If you want to read Nic’s whole story, set up an account at www.caringbridge.org and type in “nicroney” when the page asks for the name of your friend. When you click, you’ll go to Nic’s site, where you can read his whole story and sign up for an email notification whenever the page is updated.
Believe me, you want to do that. Because one of these days, Nic and I are taking a ride in his neon green VW bug. You can bet there’ll be something on his web page about the two of us cruising around town in that sweet little car.
Do you think I’d miss the opportunity to have my picture on the internet with my hero, Nic Roney, neuroblastoma survivor? Not a chance, baby. Not a chance.
