NEWS - Performance Printing

Writing my own happy ending with CHEO’s help
By Vienna Arbic with Isabelle Mailloux Pulkinghorn
My name is Vienna and I am nine years old. I’m
in grade three, play defense on my hockey team,
and enjoy doing crafts and writing stories. I love
spending time with my parents Sherry and Richard
Arbic, and my friends. And I have cancer.
My ‘real’ life had to be put on hold while the
doctors at CHEO help me get rid of cancer. Mine
is called Germ cell tumor, a very rare form of brain
cancer - and I want it to go away.
If this were a story I came up with, there wouldn’t
be a port-a-cath, operations and chemotherapy
involved. I wouldn’t need lumbar punctures and
I could be home with my parents and my dogs
instead of in the hospital. I’d be playing hockey
and graduating grade three with everyone in my
class. If this were a story I made up, it’d be funny
like the Robert Munsch books that I love so much.
But cancer is serious.
One day at hockey practice I hurt my head and
ended up with a concussion. I had all the classic
symptoms, and even after the prescribed rest period
I was not getting better. I was sleeping 18 hours a
day, falling asleep at school and again later in the
afternoon. I had severe headaches that even the pain
medicine would not relieve. I had no short-term
memory and my parents say I just wasn’t myself.
So my parents took me to CHEO. An
endocrinologist ordered a CT scan and it detected
a tumor in the center of my brain that was pressing
against my thyroid, pituitary and hypothalamus
Vassilyadi, a CHEO neurosurgeon, installed a
pressure; that’s when I started to feel much better.
The oncologists told us that Germ cell tumors in the
brain are very rare but the good news is that they
usually respond well to radiation; although some do
need a mix of radiation, chemotherapy and surgery.
In my case, we quickly started with chemotherapy.
Had it not been for my parents’ persistence to
push for physicians to investigate further because
they knew something
was wrong with me,
had it not been for the
concussion itself and
for the team of CHEO
neurologists, endocrinologists and oncologists who
care for me, my story could have had a sad ending.
But now, there’s hope.
Chemotherapy is not fun - it actually makes me
very sick. I lost my hair and I look very different
because of the cortisone, but it is helping me get
better. It is shrinking the size of my tumor, and that
is great news! Once the last cycle of chemotherapy
reduce the tumor even more and hopefully make it
go away forever. I hope we’re done by the end of
the summer so I can start my hockey season and go
back to school. Mom and dad have already found
special hockey equipment that will protect my port
(where the doctors inject the medications).
I can’t wait to get back to my real life. Until then, I
will take my medicine, continue chemo and rest so
It’s funny because I’ve always wanted to become
a doctor when I grow up. Now, as mom says, I’m
getting an insider’s view and that will help make
me be a great doctor someday. I also want to keep
writing, so maybe I’ll become a doctor-writer. But
one thing is certain: my stories will always have
happy endings. Just like this one will.
Retired educator gives back following cancer treatment at TOH
By Tracey Tong
cancer appeared
in a Barrhaven classroom in 2008 when he developed
a sudden and unrelenting pain in his back.
“I thought I had twisted it,” he recalled, “It was so
painful I had to leave class.”
He visited his family doctor and tests revealed that
“It was a shock,” he said. By that time, the cancer
had already spread to his lymph nodes and doctors
thought it might be too advanced for treatment.
He was admitted to The Ottawa Hospital
chemotherapy sessions in March 2008.
It was an amazing experience in that way. The
support of our friends and neighbours was
absolutely phenomenal.”
Now recovered, the 76-year-old father and
grandfather has been looking for ways to give back
– not just for himself, but because cancer has hit his
family hard. His father is a prostate cancer survivor,
and years ago, his brother, Carl, succumbed to
rectal cancer at age 30. Once a week he volunteers
at The Ottawa Hospital Cancer Centre as a
volunteer trainer, and last year, be began an EMC
newspaper route, donating all of his earnings
Hospital Research Institute. He has also signed up
to fundraise for The Ottawa Hospital.
“When you have cancer, you need to remain
cancer can’t spend their lives concentrating on the
disease. With my paper route and volunteering, my
mind is not on the cancer, it’s on making it better.”
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