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Teresa recounts her experience when her five-year-old son Álex was diagnosed with neuroblastoma in September 2019.
"Why did it happen to me?" That is the first question Teresa asked herself when her five-year-old son Álex was diagnosed with neuroblastoma, a tumor, on September 20, 2019. Thus, she recognizes that the hardest moments are the initial ones: "You don't accept it, you don't believe it."
The first symptoms of the disease began with the child becoming very tired and with frequent vomiting and fever. "He wasn't eating either, so they did tests to see if he had anemia," says the mother. One day his stomach started to hurt a lot and he couldn't leave the house. Faced with this situation, the mother decided to take him to the emergency room in Nonaspe, the town where they reside. "The doctor saw the tests and told us to go down to Zaragoza because he thought it was a very strong anemia," she says. But once at the Miguel Servet Hospital, the ultrasound revealed a much worse reality. Neuroblastoma.
When facing the treatment, Álex had to undergo an eight-week first phase of chemotherapy that caused him to vomit and not eat anything the days he remained in the hospital. "When he was at home he didn't vomit and he did eat so he hasn't lost weight," says Teresa. Álex, yesterday he finished his second phase of chemotherapy, which was two sessions. "The vomiting hasn't affected him that much, but he has developed sores in his throat," says his mother. Despite this, she claims that she sees the child as "lively."
After these five months, Teresa only has words of gratitude for Aspanoa for the support received and the information provided. "We have been very well supported by psychologists, you don't believe everything they do. You can't overcome it but you get into a situation," she says. Now, she notes that it is up to doctors to evaluate the situation and decide whether to perform surgery to remove the tumor.
