I'm shaving my head to raise money for childhood cancer research! Did you know that kids' cancers are different from adult cancers? This year I have chosen to honor a 3 year old boy by the name of Hudson Younge who was diagnosed with Leukemia 9 months ago.  Please see the photo gallery at the bottom of this page for pictures of Hudson. 

Hudson Younge

It all started the week of Hudson’s third birthday, when he woke up with what his family thought was pink eye. They took him to the doctor, got some medication and went home. A few days later, he developed a fever. “He had experienced a few fevers over the past several weeks, but being the fourth child and a toddler, his doctor and we were not concerned it was anything worse,” Hudson's mother, Shelby said, 

But, the day after his third birthday, he woke up with a very swollen eye. His doctor gave him an antibiotic shot to help it heal. The next day, the eye hadn’t healed, so they went back to his pediatrician, who grew concerned an infection had gotten into the boy’s eye and sent the family to Good Shepherd Hospital, where he underwent a CAT scan and blood tests.

The tests showed his eye had not been impacted, but his white blood cell count was zero. They went by ambulance to Lutheran General in Park Ridge. The eye did not heal and more tests were done. After just two days at Lutheran General, doctors did a bone marrow extraction and found Hudson had leukemia.

Hudson continues to be in remission, and his end date for all treatment is June 29, 2020. (But will see his oncologists for his entire life.) He began the maintenance phase of his treatment on January 11th. This phase will continue through the end of his treatment, and involves daily oral chemo, another different weekly oral chemo, antibiotics, 5 days a month of steroids, and then monthly intravenous chemo and spinal taps every three months. So although the intensity of hospital visits has decreased, Hudson still has a long way to go.