Taryn Baggot’s Story

February 17th, although my daughter has forgotten the date, I her mother, never will. That day at precisely a few minutes after 3 pm, I received a call that would forever change my world and that of my family.

The day before, we had our 13 year old daughter to the walk-in clinic because of complaints of severe headaches and stomach cramps that had become more frequent over the preceding three months. A few weeks before, she also developed a fever that lasted 9 days. When the doctor ordered bloodwork, I honestly thought that, at the most, she might have contracted something like mono, and at the least they would indicate there was nothing wrong at all. I never expected the doctor, on the other end of the phone that afternoon, to be telling me to pack a bag for her, and get her to CHEO immediately! I remember not letting him end the conversation till he told me WHY??? He mentioned immature white blood cells, and I persisted to know what that meant. He finally said “it’s usually indicative of Leukemia”.

So in a whirlwind, the next days passed as my daughter learned what her illness meant and my husband and I tried to understand how much our lives were to change. I had to give up my job, as I ran a home daycare, and this just would not work with a child undergoing cancer treatment. 2 1/2 yrs, how long and forever that seemed, as we were told this is how long her treatment would be.

We are now at the two year mark, and as I look back and remember the surgery to implant her port-a-cath, the lumbar punctures, the Bone marrow asparates, the painful chemo injections into her legs, her severe allergic reaction to one of those chemo drugs, her hair loss, bone pain, headaches, the unrelenting nasty side effects to many of her chemo drugs,,,,and yet,,,,,she can ALWAYS manage to put a smile on her face,

I am SO SO thankful for a hospital like CHEO and the Oncology Staff there, many we have come to know and love! It is they that showed us hope when we thought we had lost it, gave us courage when we were running low, and laughter and smiles when they knew thats what we needed. I say WE,,,,because CHEO is there to support the WHOLE family!! I know Taryn will come through this the same caring person she was before, but also a more compassionate and stronger person. We look ahead now to the end of her treatment with great hope. We know her risk of relapse hangs over us, but as more and more time passes, so too hopefully will that dark cloud, but knowing to that no matter what the future holds for our daughter, CHEO is going to be there for us! For now, we live one day, one week at a time, celebrating small milestones that to Taryn and us are HUGE!