Taekwondo prodigy battling rare leukemia
He’s used to sparring with opponents, but this is a different fight
AURORA» Three weeks after the first symptoms of a rare leukemia struck taekwondo prodigy Isaac Martin with the suddenness of a spin kick he never saw coming, the 17-year-old lay in a hospital bed at Children’s Hospital wishing he could be instructing the youngsters who adore him at Stapleton Family Karate.
Beloved for the sweet kindness he has shown them and their parents, Martin was weak and bored last week but comforted by the many cards and gifts that have come to the hospital’s seventh floor, where he is receiving chemotherapy.
“YOU INSPIRE and IMPACT so many people,” said one note with a color picture of two tiny taekwondo students, urging him to “keep up the fight” because they miss him.
A third-degree black belt phenom who has won 11 gold medals at national taekwondo competitions, Martin was diagnosed on Sept. 28 with Acute Promyelocytic Leukemia (APML). The taekwondo champion and his family welcome the encouragement from his students.
“At this moment I’m kind of feeling better than I was when I came in, but I’m still feeling scared,” Martin said last week. “It’s just a lot to take in, so, a little nervous.”
His mother, Marcella Martin, raised and home-schooled 10 kids, seven of whom were adopted. Isaac is one of the adoptees but Marcella was present at his
She has been widowed three times. Her children range from ages 17 to 37.
“Isaac asks every new nurse or doctor that walks in, ‘Am I going to live?’ ” Marcella said. “Or, ‘What are my chances?’ “
Actually they are good. He is facing eight months of chemotherapy, but his pediatric oncology doctor, Kristen Eisenman, said his form of leukemia is “very treatable and very curable.”
The diagnosis came about 10 days after a lump appeared on his leg. Over the next 10 days, 14 more appeared. Then blood blisters developed on his lips, mouth and tongue.
“It looked like something out of a horror movie,” said Micah Martin, one of Issac’s six brothers and the owner of the martial arts school where Isaac works as an instructor.
Eisenman said the sudden onset is common for APML, but Issac and his family are still reeling from the shocking diagnosis.
“It was unreal,” Isaac said. “I didn’t process it probably for the first three days, didn’t really think it was real at all. I went from being a martial arts instructor, normal kid, to having to stay in the hospital and just do nothing all day.”
Charissa Gray, a pediatric oncology nurse on Isaac’s floor at Children’s, has a daughter who is one of the “Little Dragons” (ages 4-6) learning at Stapleton Family Karate.
“We’ve had to keep stopping visitations because he had so many visitors,” Gray said. “He’s just an amazing person and an amazing coach. Every time I walk in the room, he asks how my daughter is.”
Isaac’s mother said his ability to lift the spirits of those around him presented itself at a very young age.
“If it hadn’t been for Isaac, when my second husband died (of diabetes) I don’t know if we would have made it,” she said. “He had just turned 1, his adoption was final the week before my husband died, and he just kept us happy and laughing through everything that was going wrong. He’s always been that way. Right now it’s hard to see him like this, because the medicine and everything has changed him — he’s just not himself. He’s albirth. ways been there for us. He’s been an amazing kid. He’s never given me problems — never.”
A Go Fund Me page set up with the goal of raising $25,000 had pulled in almost $22,000 as of Wednesday morning. When Isaac spots a crying kid too frightened to get on the taekwondo mat, he has a knack for soothing the child and easing those fears.
“He has a way with small children, and parents are just shocked at how he can do it,” Marcella said. “I don’t know where he picked it up. It’s just in him. He just has an amazing ability with children.”
His dream is to own his own martial arts school one day.
“In all the life skills I’ve learned from taekwondo, the first thing is perseverance, which has helped me through a lot of things,” Isaac said. “And confidence, respect, focus. It’s given me all these things ever since I was a little kid, and it’s helped me grow up through hard things.”
Another instructor at the school, Zach Gonzalez, said when the kids see Isaac do back flips and “jump-spinning twist kicks,” they look up to him, and it makes them want to be able to do those things some day.
“As a father, if I want my kid to grow up and be like anybody, I want them to be like Isaac Martin,” Gonzalez said. “He’s so disciplined and respectful and humble. He’s just an amazing kid, more than any words I can come up with can express.”
John Meyer: jmeyer@denverpost.com or @johnmeyer