In early 2005, Krista Dick, then seven years old, was prescribed medication to treat what doctors believed was a persistent sinus infection.
After taking the medication for several weeks, Krista was still tired and lethargic so she made another visit to the doctor’s office on May 13, 2005. Two hours later, she was at the Medical University of South Carolina where she was told she had cancer.
She began chemotherapy that evening.
Krista was diagnosed with acute lymphocytic leukemia (ALL) – the most common cancer in children and adolescents, according to the American Cancer Society.
“I felt really bad because I didn’t know if I was going to live or not,” said Krista, who tried to remain upbeat despite numerous chemotherapy sessions, blood transfusions and days and nights spent at the hospital. “I knew that if I was sad, my parents would feel sad and would start to think I wouldn’t be OK. I had to stay positive for them.”
Thirty days after her diagnosis, a blood sample showed that the cancer was in remission. While this was great news, Krista would still be forced to miss more than a year of school because of her weakened immune system.
“The hardest part was not being able to see my friends and not playing outside,” said Krista, who was able to pass second-grade thanks to house visits from a teacher.
In the four years since her cancer was discovered, Krista spent about 200 days in the hospital. However, the avid swimmer, singer and dancer is now cancer-free and she hopes to help other children who have the disease.
Krista, who will be a sixth-grader at Sangaree Middle School in the fall, will accompany her father to Washington, D.C., June 22, to join 400 other families from across the country to take part in “Reach The Day.”
Last year, Congress passed a bill authorizing $150 million to be used over the next five years to boost pediatric cancer research. With the country mired in an economic crisis, the CureSearch National Childhood Cancer Foundation is sponsoring Reach The Day to encourage the country’s leaders to not cut childhood cancer funding, which remains a possibility.
Krista and her father, David, will be among the hundreds of families to meet with congressional leaders to implore them to continue to fund pediatric cancer research, which David says should not be on the chopping block.
“As a parent, to hear the words ‘your child has cancer’ is shocking,” David said. “To this day, it makes the hair stand up on my arms. No child or parent should have to go through what we’ve had to.”
The five-year survival rate for children diagnosed with ALL is more than 80 percent, according to the American Cancer Society, yet those odds didn’t comfort David.
“I thought more about the 20 percent than the 80 percent,” David said. “I couldn’t believe there was even the slightest chance she wasn’t going to make it.”
David, an avid sports enthusiast who grew up admiring professional athletes, says Krista is now his hero because of the bravery and optimism she exhibited during her battle with leukemia.
“We as adults can forget the important things – the every day little things like telling someone you love them,” David said. “Throughout this whole process, her smiling and can-do attitude has reminded me of that.”
Although Krista has made a full recovery, she still has blood drawn once a month at MUSC. While there, she often talks with other children fighting cancer.
“I tell them to not worry about anything and that if you believe you’ll (beat) the cancer, then you can,” Krista said. “I tell them one day you can end up like me – cancer-free.”