Mother to help Light the Night
On Thursday evening, hundreds of lighted lanterns will illuminate the sky in Little Rock in honor of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society’s annual Light the Night walk. Among those walking and carrying a “survivor” balloon will be Emily Ingram of Little Rock.
It began on her very first Mother’s Day in 2010. She felt very blessed that Sunday afternoon, playing with her 9-month-old daughter, Kate, and enjoying being 20 weeks pregnant with Kate’s little brother. That night, though, everything changed.
A persistent cough she had during the day grew violent and would not stop. Ingram’s husband, Scott, took her to the emergency room at Baptist Health Medical Center in North Little Rock
that evening. Although she was pregnant, one of the ER doctors sent her for a CT scan of her chest. The scan revealed a mass pressing against her windpipe. Soon, a biopsy confirmed that Ingram had Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
The next day, she met her first oncologist. Her obstetrician, Dr. Bryan Fuller, immediately sent her to Dr. Paul Wendel, a high-risk OB-GYN at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.
In a life-changing 24 hours, Ingram, 31, had gone from the celebration of notyet-one-year of motherhood to exploring options for treating blood cancer while pregnant.
“I was, of course, torn between my daughter and my unborn son,” Ingram says. “I needed to go through treatment because I wanted to be there for my daughter, but I also wanted to delay treatment until after I delivered a healthy baby boy. I mean, he was already my son. He was five months along and kicking me all the time.”
Her team of doctors decided to proceed with the treatment while she was pregnant. “They felt like the baby would be protected from the chemotherapy. He went through seven rounds of chemo with me,” she says. “The biggest problem we had to deal with was nourishment. He was a growing baby and needed all the nourishment I could give him. At the same time, I needed to keep my own strength up and needed the nourishment too.”
She discontinued chemotherapy long enough to have a Caesarean section, but resumed treatment two weeks after giving birth to Fuller, who was named after their obstetrician. An additional four weeks of radiation completed her treatment.
When her children were 1 and 2, Ingram underwent a bone marrow transplant. To prepare for the transplant, she had to move in with her parents, leaving behind her husband and her children. She needed to create as sterile an environment as possible for herself. “It was torture not to be with them but it was worth it,” she says.
Ingram has been cancer-free since March 2011.
At the time of Ingram’s cancer crisis, she did not know about the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society in Little Rock. It was much later, during her radiation treatment at Central Arkansas Radiation Therapy Institute, that she received information about the organization.
“I think a lot of people just don’t know where to turn in a crisis. You are so overwhelmed and shocked by the diagnosis, and you are just trying to get through each day,” Ingram says. She hopes that with an event like Light the Night, more people will know they can turn to Leukemia & Lymphoma Society for support and information. She also wants hospitals and doctors to refer patients to the group as a resource when they are diagnosed.
The organization offers moral and financial support to patients and also provides a $100 stipend to anyone in treatment or follow-up care for expenses. The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society also has a co-pay assistance program. If a blood cancer patient is unable to afford drug co-pays or monthly payments on health insurance, the patient may be eligible for aid.
Although the group does not directly enroll people for the bone marrow registry, they do refer people to Be the Match, Delete Blood Cancer and other organizations that register donors. At this week’s Light the Night walk, attendees will have the chance to “get swabbed” and register.
“All you have to do is swab the inside of your cheeks with a Q-tip! It’s that easy,” Ingram says.
Having cancer changes your life. Surviving cancer gives you a second chance. Two weeks after Fuller was born, Ingram was back at work as vice president of Arkansas Coalition for Excellence, a resource center for nonprofits. When she reflects on her bout with lymphoma, Ingram says, “There is no time for cancer when you’ve got two babies and a husband and a job.”
LIGHTING UP THE NIGHT
Light the Night is a national walk held each year by the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. This fall, the walk will take place in more than 200 communities across the country. Participants in the Little Rock event Thursday evening will gather at First Security Amphitheatre in Riverfront Park and walk to the Clinton Presidential Center and back, which is approximately a mile. Walkers may participate as individuals or as a team.