Five-year-old girl has brain tumour successfully removed

A five year old girl, Adalyn Funk, recently had her brain tumour removed. 

Melissa Funk says her daughter has been doing exceptionally well.  

“We've basically had every miracle possible for her situation, which we are so incredibly grateful for.”  

Funk says her daughter’s emotions are very up and down at times, going through all of this trauma and change, but she is back to her usual schedule for the most part.  

“She is back to running around, playing with her friends, going to daycare, still going to appointments.”   

She says she is very proud of Adalyn, as she is looking back on her experience and telling everyone her story in a positive way.  

“That makes me tear up at times because I'm seeing this as something that can only strengthen us instead of break us down. We'll still have our hard moments, but we are getting stronger every day.”

The Funk family is glad things are returning to normal.

They recently received good news from the oncologist that there is no cancer and no malignant tumour. Adalyn was struggling with a low grade glioma called Pilocytic Astrocytoma.  

This means there are no cancer cells that are active.  

Funk says that if the tumour is fully gone now, which it likely is as they couldn’t see it on the MRI or CT scan after surgery, then that would mean she is fully cured, and there would be a 99 per cent chance that the tumour would never grow back.  

If a portion of the tumour is still there then there is a 10-15 per cent chance that it will grow back.   

“This should be a blip in our life that now we can move on, and of course keep doing follow-ups and checkups that it doesn't come back, but for now we can move on and process everything that has happened in the last month and a half.”  

Funk says she and her family are so grateful for all the community support.  

"That is the number one thing that has absolutely blown my mind. That is what brings me to tears more than anything else is how our community has come together and prayed for us, supported us, blessed us with meals, financially,” she says. “We've got so many amazing stories that Adalyn will be able to understand one day when she grows up and we just feel very blessed.”  

Adalyn will go for an MRI at the end of December and will continue getting MRI’s every three months for a first year.   

Funk notes they also recently had an appointment with an eye specialist yesterday, and Adalyn's eyes are healthy and her vision has not been damaged in any of this.  

“She does have her cross-eyed situation, but they are hoping it will resolve itself. She is back in December to get it looked at again. They are considering offering Botox on her eye muscles to help loosen them so the eyes can go back to normal.”  

This would be done in January along with her MRI. This would be a temporary fix, and if her eyes don’t fix within a year then they might do a procedure.  

Funk notes that Lynn & Liana are holding a warehouse sale this Sunday where they are selling their products 90 per cent off retail pricing, and a portion of the proceeds from the sale will being going to the Brain Tumour Foundation of Canada.  

“Now that we're able to donate a portion of our proceeds to the brain tumor foundation that just makes me feel like I'm making a difference and allowing Adalyn’s story to continue on and make a positive impact in Canada.”  

 

With files from Corny Rempel

 

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