#RallyKid Fletcher

Fletcher was born in March of 2009. Being born an almost 10-pound baby, he gave William Wallace a run for his money on his battle cry. As Fletch grew, so did his curiosities. He is an old soul who loves being a vivacious reader. He never kept still and always included everyone around him if he felt they were being left out. Fletcher was never one to shy away but liked to keep to himself when he had enough people-time. At age 7, he began to have terrible migraines. His being diagnosed with ASD made the doctors conclude it was just his low threshold for pain. He'd be sick to his stomach, and there were multiple times he was found withering in pain on the bathroom floor. One afternoon, I took him to the ER. After a CT scan, the doctor pulled me out of the room and said, "There's something on the scan that shouldn't be there." An hour later, we were life-flighted to DC from Fairfax. Two hours after that, an MRI produced answers. They found a large, and by the looks of it, a very difficultly placed tumor. The neurosurgeon was confident in his ability to perform the surgery, even though it was wrapped around the brainstem. During surgery, the team saw how the tumor had calcified, and there was new soft tissue growth. After an 8 hour surgery, pathology confirmed it was medulloblastoma, group 3. He made lifelong friends in the darkest time of treatment. We kept prayers high, along with our heads. We were positive, and though there were many breaking points, he never gave up. We didn’t know this battle would have raged and waged such a heavy war. We kept the dance parties going and books stacked high at his bedside. Medulloblastoma is an aggressive brain tumor that has a survival rate of 80% in 5 years. Fletcher is a lucky and honestly, extremely blessed child to now have made it to his sweet 16! We have lost many friends. There are countless difficulties in his everyday living. You wouldn't know it by looking at him. He still has a bright light in his heart. He still has that great sense of wonder and joy of reading. His treatment left him with deafness, cataracts, neuropathy, growth shortage, thyroid, and heart issues, and now we have found no hope for children of his own. He has significant cognitive delays, and yet, he is alive. Alive and willing to share his story and his love of books with his service pup Starlight Cordelia by his side. #cleverfletcherfightscancer

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