Strangers’ kindness is saving little battler’s life
Brave 5-year-old Willy Boylett’s on a harrowing cancer journey and his family are grateful for the kind Kiwis who are helping save his life.
On a dreary Auckland Sunday, Sarah Kerby sits in Starship children hospital’s ICU with a birthday cake she knows her son, Willy, can’t blow the candles out on.
She watches her little boy’s chest rise and fall with the aid of a ventilator and quietly celebrates his entry into the 5th year of his precious life.
“We’re just trying to give him as normal a year as we can, under the circumstances,” she tells the Herald. “I’m just trying to be a normal mum.”
Nelson-based Kerby, 31, is grateful to be sitting there at all. Twice the week earlier she was told by doctors to say goodbye to Willy, who was diagnosed with cancer in February as a cheerful, active 4-year-old.
Since then, he’d been undergoing chemotherapy in Christchurch for neuroblastoma — a cancer he’s been given a 50/50 chance of surviving.
But during his last round, he developed neutropenic sepsis and was airlifted to Starship.
“He was the only cancer kid [in Starship’s ICU] at the time so it’s quite a mind complex to know that your kid is the sickest cancer kid in the country,” says Kerby, who also has a 9-year-old son, Baillie.
But after 18 days in ICU — where the average stay is 48 hours — something remarkable happened.
“He just started doing better,” says Kerby. “Now he’s up and about.
“He had a shower yesterday, and there’s talk of maybe moving us back to Christchurch hospital today,” Kerby tells the Herald, her voice a mix of exhaustion and hope.
Willy’s diagnosis came after a month of illness including fevers and suspected ear infections and was first thought to be leukemia.
But an MRI found neuroblastoma in the form of a 12cm tumour on his adrenal gland. A less optimistic prognosis, it marked the beginning of what’s been a nightmare for Kerby, Willy and their family.
“It’s hell,” says Kerby. “It’s all I can describe it as. You’re worried about your son who’s just been given a 50/50 prognosis, but it just destroys your whole life. Your ability to work, your home. You’re moving to another town, supporting your other children.
“The ripple effect just impacts everyone,” says the brave mum, who takes week-about shifts with Willy’s dad, Jake Boylett, to be with their son for treatment in Christchurch.
Through it all, Kerby says her little boy has been “a champion”.
Amid the trauma of watching her little boy’s fight, Kerby has been heartened by something thousands of ordinary Kiwis are doing: Donating blood.
In the past 10 months, Willy has needed 88 transfusions. Almost half of those have been in the three weeks he’s spent in Starship.
“It’s amazing seeing this gift that some complete stranger has taken time out of their day to go and donate, and seeing that coming back into my boy to literally keep him alive,” says Kerby. “When he’s due for a transfusion, you can tell ’cause he’s just a ghost, you know.
“He’s transparent, he’s lethargic and then as soon as a blood product comes back into him it’s just like giving someone a really big cup of coffee.”
Kerby, who has started donating herself and describes the process as “cathartic”, says she has immense gratitude for people “who will never know” how much they’ve helped.
“I think people have no idea how often transfusions can occur.”
New Zealand Blood Service (NZBS) national marketing and communications manager Asuka Burge says while Kiwis are heading into holidays and taking a break from their normal lives, people will still get sick, require ongoing treatment, have accidents and have babies — all of which could need a transfusion.
Last year 53,537 units of blood, plasma and platelets were issued between December to February, she says.
Ahead of Christmas, 16,467 donations still need to be made for a summer that has a forecast 4 per cent increase in demand on last year.
Meanwhile, it’s hoped Willy, who tells his mum he wants to be a nurse or a surgeon when he grows up, can enjoy Christmas at home in Nelson with his family.
“We’re just really hopeful and optimistic that we might be allowed home for Christmas,” says Kerby.