Jake Spachner

Jake is an energetic, outgoing 4 year old boy that was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia on September 29th. Up until a few days before that, life was as normal as could be. At the beginning of September, Jake started his first year at Stock Preschool. He was making new friends and breaking away from the shy shell he had once carried. Jake was still beaming from the extremely fun summer he had shared with his family and friends. The weekend of September 27th started with Jake waking up to extreme left leg pain. This pain spread to both legs and then to his abdomen. We were in and out of the doctor's office and then the ER, with the idea of a virus inflamming his joints. Not until Monday, September 29th, was blood work done to confirm our worst fear. Jake has been a fighter through all of this, and has revealed amazing strength. This will be a battle for him, but one he will surely conquer. Jake is surrounded by a loving group of family and friends who will enable and empower him to take every step necessary to beat this disease.

Jake's prognosis for recovery is good, but he will need to undergo three years of chemotherapy and treatments. In addition to chemo, he regularly has to have spinal taps and bone marrow aspirations and has already had one hospital stay because he caught a common cold and couldn't fight it.

Jake's mom, Jessica had to take a leave of absence from work to help care for Jake and his sister, Kacey. At this point in Jake's treatment, she is only able to work part-time now. As you can imagine, this has put their family in quite a financial bind and funds raised at our outing will help the family tremendously.