we're kicking things off with our story of inspiration we meet a young woman
who's enjoying life after leukemia and shares a message of hope for others
moments like this walk with her daughter are incredibly special to Shelby
litovsky it's just so fun because she watches the birds and she's just so cute
she's in a really cute stage right now that happiness has been a long time
coming for Shelby who just a few years earlier was diagnosed with leukemia
leukemia has a blood disorder it's also considered a cancer of the bone marrow
the bone marrow is the part of the body that's responsible for making all of the
blood elements leukemia is a problem where the bone marrow is not functioning
normally patients with acute leukemia can present with either too high of a
white blood cell count or to local white blood cell count patients may present
with fatigue shortness of breath bruising bleeding fever or other
symptoms of an infection the reason that I was able to find out is that I got
pregnant my blood work came back that my white cell count was pretty low so I
went to the hospital feeling totally normal
other than a little tired and was there for 101 days receiving treatment it was
a bit of a whirlwind I think because you know you find out and then you're all of
a sudden in the hospital and you can't get out
Shelby had several rounds of chemotherapy but ultimately still needed
a stem-cell transplant she had very close monitoring immediately after her
transplant she attained a hundred percent donor Kaymer ISM meaning that
all of the cells in her bone marrow and were her donors we were very I think
very lucky that we were able to get her disease in remission after transplant
well the transplant helped Shelby get better in the end she wasn't able to
continue with her pregnancy we unfortunately lost the baby
Thanksgiving Day so that was probably the hardest day of my life harder than
being diagnosed but he was our angel we knew that the next step or what we
needed to do for him is is to just fight harder and get better and so that's what
we did after a tough journey to health Shelby was eventually able to go home I
was just happy to get
to get home be in my own space
several years after that Shelby and her husband had one more reason to celebrate
welcoming a daughter to their family I cannot describe how amazing it felt how
much of a miracle was that we were able to have this little girl and when she
came it was by far the best day of my entire life
now the entire family is able to enjoy the small moments together she loves to
read books with me with her dad with her grandparents she loves books I'm doing
great I've had all great reports I you know haven't had any setbacks thank
goodness we just continued to live our lives and be happy that we're on the
other end of things she has no evidence of leukemia the
expectation at this point is that she will hopefully not have any new
complications from transplant Shelby's message to others living with
leukemia is a simple one there is so much to be said about being hopeful and
remaining positive having people around you that make you happy and have your
back and support you those are the things that got me through
so I just would tell anybody going through this to know that it can all
work out and you can be okay and you can come out on the other end