Please help Anderson

Over the past month or so I have become involved with an online community of other mothers that have babies born in July 2005. It has been so cool to have someone to "talk" to that is going through some of the same things since our kids are all the same age. So far one little boy named Michael is fighting leukemia (luckily his parents have awesome insurance that has covered almost everything) and another little girl Emma died on Feb 22 after her battle with a lot of health problems.

While I don't really know these people outside of the July boards their stories have really touched me especially since they are the same age as Lucas. That is why when I heard about this little boy named Anderson who has brain stem ependymoma I knew I had to tell my friends and family about this little boy and ask you to keep him in your prayers and if possible donate to a fund that a friend of their family has set up.

Here is a little bit about Anderson written by a family friend Toni:

Michelle and her family received devastating news on Monday; their son Anderson has been diagnosed with a brain stem ependymoma. He had been sick for the past couple of weeks, and last weekend he couldn't keep anything down, so his mom took him to the ER. He later seized and coded, and they realized that he had fluid buildup in his brain. An MRI revealed that there was a tumor on his brainstem, that had finger-like appendages stuck between the muscle and arteries of the brain stem. These types of tumors have a terrible prognosis, but the drs agreed to try surgery. Michelle and Jon were warned that he probably wouldn't survive the surgery, and if he did paralysis and other issues were likely. So Jon, Michelle and their 2 1/2 year old daughter Ella had to say their good-byes to their little guy.

Thankfully, he survived the surgery, but the surgeons were only able to remove 90% of the tumor. The rest will be treated with chemotherapy, which will be started when Anderson is strong enough to withstand it. The prognosis is still quite grim, since most children who are diagnosed with this die within the first year of diagnosis.

In the meantime, Michelle, who runs a daycare out of her home, has been at the hospital. She certainly won't be able to continue watching kids, so they are losing a huge chunk of their income. I feel terrible for them, as there account is already overdrawn and they don't have many options as far as finances go.

So, I started a fund to try and help the financial burden that is on this family right now. I am reaching out to everyone I know to help, because I can't do this alone, and neither can they. I have a web site that is linked to a PayPal donation page, where you can donate by credit card or checking account. I also have the address of where you could send a check if you wanted.

This board is full of mothers who have children the same age as Anderson. He is one day younger than my daughter Juliette, and instead of watching to see if he will crawl they are praying that he survives another day.

PLEASE help me to help them! It isn't fair that children like Anderson and Michael should be faced with such difficult challenges at such a young age, but we can't change that. All we can do is offer help in any way we can. And what this family needs is help paying their bills and buying their groceries.

If you have any questions, please feel free to email me at aid4anderson@yahoo.com

And thank you in advance for at least looking at his site!!!http://www.aid4anderson.com