In exactly two months, someone will win the keys to the brand new St. Jude dream home.
It's a beautiful home, but more importantly monies raised here will help the St. Jude Children's Hospital in Memphis, which is doing crucial work to help find cures for childhood cancer and other catastrophic illnesses.
News Leader 9's Barbara Gauthier recently visited the hospital and met some incredible families, like an Arkansas mom and son who say St. Jude changed their lives.
Meet 6-year-old Zane Rimes, a little boy with a huge imagination and his mom says an even bigger heart.
Miranda Rimes will never forget the day little Zane got sick. It started as a normal day, but when she picked him up from school something was different.
"He had 3 little pink dots on his face which I later learned is called petichei, which is basically a broken capillary under your skin but it can be an systematic for a whole host of more serious things," Miranda said.
Doctors ran tests on Zane and within a few hours discovered something was seriously wrong. Miranda rushed him to the hospital that she thought could best treat him, which was two hours away, watching as her son grew sicker by the minute.
"And the best way I can describe it is like a momma tiger, I rushed to the counter and I screamed he needs blood transfusions I need a doctor right now.? And at this point he was passing out, he had some bruising on his skin. He has acute lympoblastic leukemia and it can be very quickly on setting so that was the night everything changed for us," Miranda recalls.
That was September 2010. Soon after that Zane was sent to St. Jude children's hospital in Memphis, where we met him and his mom Miranda last fall.?
After two years of treatment for lymphoblastic leukemia - the most common form of childhood cancer - you can see Zane is doing well and keeping his mother very busy. She describes coming to St. Jude as an "out of body experience in a good way."
"It's what I would describe as a sanctuary," Miranda said. "A place where you can come and you don't have to deal with the outside staring or misinformation, here is a very peaceful place and a very hopeful place and a very happy place."
She says Zane is happy. When we asked him what he likes most about St. Jude, he says the toys.
"This is actually a space shift, and autobots drive on it and it's like a medical thing and actually I'm working on it..." Zane explains.
When we met them, Zane and his mom were hoping to return home to Arkansas soon. Miranda's advice to other parents who might one day fine themselves in her place is to be what she calls a "momma tiger," to make sure they get the best treatment available... then she says live in the moment.
"It's not all about treating the illness, it's about birthday parties and calling grandparents and fulfilling your normal milestones as if you had a well baby," Miranda said. "Because honestly at the end of the day my baby's gonna be compassionate because when I'm sick he's gonna know how to take care of me and a lot of that you can't teach that he's just going to know because he's been here at St. Jude and he's been surrounded by love."
Copyright 2013 WTVM. All rights reserved.
Source: http://www.wtvm.com/story/21302563/meet-a-6-year-old-cancer-patient-at-st-jude-childrens-hospital
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