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Quinn’s fight against Leukaemia

  • 9 months in

      26 November 2024
    Posted by: Brynn Armstrong
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    Hey everyone, a little update on our wee girl.

    Quinn has had a really challenging past few months as we now reach 9 months into this journey.

    In October, Quinn got to take her first ambulance ride after spiking a fever of 40.4°c and ending up in Paediatric Intensive Care with Sepsis. We were extremely fortunate that she bounced back after 10 days in Starship.

    We are currently at back at Starship having been rushed to ED 13 days ago with fevers. She is currently stable but her blood counts are so low that we are in protective isolation as she has no ability to fight any infection or virus she may pick up. It's an incredibly hard time with both Mum and Dad having to stay at hospital and be off work to ensure she's cared for while here at hospital.

    In between hospital stays she's been receiving her standard Chemotherapy and all of the challenges that come with it. Her hair fallen out again and she has been wiped by all the medication with lots of nausea, pain and skin rashes. Yet, as always, she has taken it all in her stride and shows us how incredibly resilient and inspiring she can be. Her smile and personality has never wavered and we couldn't be more proud of her!!

    As always we are eternally grateful for the way our people have held our whānau. Without you we would not be where we are. Love you 🩷

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    • 27/11/2024 by Haidee Renata

      Sending aroha to you on this heart-wrenching journey as you witness and support your girl through so much pain. Aroha from one friend’s friend to another (ex Pipi’s māmā of Naia).

  • 6 month update on our girl

      8 August 2024
    Posted by: Brynn Armstrong
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    We were 6 months on Thursday since our little Quinn's leukemia diagnosis.

    The last couple of months have been incredibly intense for everyone with Quinn in hospital for four days every two weeks to receive high dose chemo for 24 hours, then a rescue drug, and the following days to flush it out before we go home. It has taken a massive toll on her with extreme nausea, vomiting and fatigue but, as always she has taken it in her stride with her beautiful smile and personality shining through!

    Last month we were admitted back into starship as Bubba managed to develop shingles on top of ongoing chemotherapy.

    We also had a week where her ENT team thought that she had a secondary cancer. She DOESNT and we are still unsure why her general anaesthetics are so risky but we will continue to try and figure it out!

    We are currently at Starship for the final round of this treatment before we enter a new phase that has recently been introduced after a successful trial resulting in significantly higher survival rates!

    Despire everything, Quinn has grown so unbelievably confident in herself, having been diagnosed at 16 months old, still unsteady on her feet and slowly learning new words, to now running around the hospital and sweet talking all the doctors and nurses.

    As always we have been so incredibly blown away by everyone's love and support, from care packages, visits, to simple check ins.

    Thank you to everyone who has been there for us so far in each and every way

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  • Update on Quinn's treatment

      25 May 2024
    Posted by: Brynn Armstrong
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    Hi everyone, just a quick update on how things have been going for beautiful little Quinn.

    We have reached the end of this phase of treatment with her responding to it all as she should, but with quite a few speed bumps along the way. This phase has been very heavy and meant lots of trips to Staship for theatre for lumbar punctures, chemotherapy, and bone marrow aspirations. She has then had chemotherapy administered by the community nurses at home the following three days and by us every night. All of this is in addition to her myriad of ongoing medications.

    Unfortunately, theatre has been tough on her, with ongoing issues to do with her airways closing up while under general anaesthetic. We are super grateful for the amazing Starship team who help get her through these but as you can imagine, it takes a massive toll on her and us.

    We are currently staying at Starship at the moment, having been here for the past 9 days, after she developed bad fevers and was rushed to ED. Fortunately she's doing well and we are now just waiting for her white blood cells to recover to a point that she has some immune system before we are allowed home again.

    Once again, a massive thank you to everyone for all your incredible support. We are so grateful for everyone who has reached out to us, and incredible generosity through the Give a Little page, which has been life saving with both of us currently not at work while Quinn is staying in hospital.

    Love you all heaps 🩷 xx

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  • Update from Māmā and Pāpā

      29 March 2024
    Posted by: Brynn Armstrong
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    Hey everyone, a quick update on Quinn and her leukaemia journey 💚

    We have successfully made it through the first phase of treatment, with the induction phase going to plan and her responding to treatment how she should. It's taken a big toll on her, as we are sure you can imagine, but she has been an absolute trooper and taking it all in her stride incredibly.

    We are home from hospital now which has brought its own challenges, with no immune system, limited sleeping or eating, medication and supplement feeding through her nasal gastric tube, emergency hospital trips with overnight stays, and much more.

    We are now on to the consolidation phase of treatment, with 2-3 trips to starship weekly, chemotherapy 4 days a week, and theatre once a week for lumbar punctures and intrathecal chemotherapy (into the spinal fluid).

    It has taken a heavy toll on us as a family, but we are absolutely overwhelmed by the incredible love and support we have received from everyone. Words can't explain the gratitude we feel for everyone that has had our backs throughout this and helped us get through. For everyone who has contributed to the Give A Little, we are blown away by your generosity and can't thank you enough. We are sorry we aren't able to message everyone individually to say thank you.

    We will keep giving updates where we can as things progress and do our best to respond to messages while we juggle work, hospital, and care for our baby girl.

    Jimmy, Brynn, Quinn 💚💚💚

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  • Brave little fighter

      28 February 2024
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    On behalf of Brynn, Jimmy and Quinn we would like to thank you for the immense outpouring of love and support over the past three weeks since their world was turned upside down. It has been an emotional rollercoaster of the unknown and extremely overwhelming for the most part, however they have read every single message of support and love which has helped brighten many cloudy days so far!

    Exciting news for our beautiful girl as she has been discharged from Starship hospital and graduated to “outpatient” status, which means she can spend time back in the familiarity of her home with Mum, Dad and Nona. However Quinn’s treatment plan now requires her to travel to Starship Hospital 3-4 times per week for chemotherapy, monitoring and ongoing surgeries. The side effects of treatment are challenging and heartbreaking with next to no energy, constant pain and hair loss setting in yet Quinn’s cheeky personality still shines through most days.

    Brynn and Jimmy are learning to navigate this chapter the best they can and are hanging in there, it is an extremely long road ahead requiring full time care and your continued love and support is cherished by all.

    🤍

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