Michelle Rief
By her mother Lynne Rief
Michelle's school dedicated their 1997-1998 yearbook to Michelle. If you would like to read the two page dedication, click on yearbook one and two below. The files are each about 240K, a size absolutely necessary so that the quality would not be compromised.
Michelle was a smart, funny, happy nine year old in 1993 when she first began complaining that her stomach hurt. We repeatedly took her to the doctor's office, who after running test after test could still find nothing wrong. Her bowel movements had definitely changed but it didn't occur to the doctors' that a tumor could be the cause. The doctor did warn me of one thing, if I saw blood in her stool, I was to tell him immediately.
After a frustrating six weeks, I lied to the doctor and said I saw blood. He immediately authorized us to go see a gastroenterologist. He performed a colonoscopy but saw nothing.
In November, a sore appeared on her bottom. Antibiotics did nothing, so we were referred to a surgeon who drained it. The pathology from the drainage showed malignant cancer cells and a follow-up CT showed a large tumor in her pelvic area.
In January of 1994, she started radiation and chemo. After completing six rounds by August 1994, the tumor was resected in a major surgery. She had two more rounds of chemo and we thought we were done.
In March of 1995, a follow-up CT of her chest showed seven tumors of different sizes in her lungs. We started chemo again, a different variation called ICE, which worked pretty well. In May of 1995, hundreds of little spots showed up on her lungs, and a biopsy revealed histoplasmosis, a fungal infection. She was given ampho-B and resumed chemo.
In August, we harvested Michelle's twin sisters stem cells. Megan had a Groshong catheter inserted into her chest, and the cells were harvested for 5 days. Enough was collected for 10 bags to give to Michelle after each round of chemo. Michelle was given the first bag in September, 1995, and it worked great. Her counts began to rise on day 10 just like clockwork.
In December, more spots showed up and another biopsy was scheduled. This time it was a different infection called coccidiomycosis. She was given more ampho-B and started daily diflucan as a prophylactic treatment. She continued chemo.
In January of 1996, a transfer was made to the City of Hope. She had several bouts of pneumonia, but subsequent scans of her chest and pelvis made us all believe that we had beaten the cancer. She continued to have more chemo, but because of the toxicity of the treatment and her kidneys taking longer to recover, each chemo was delayed by two months or more. She finally finished 10 rounds of ICE therapy in 18 months. In December, it was decided to stop chemo.
In January of 1997, a PET scan showed that there was still some evidence of disease but it was too small for CT and MRI's to pick up. We decided to "watch, wait and see" if the cancer was really there or if it was a false positive. She continued to go to school, playing drums in the band, playing softball in Little League, going to theme parks whenever possible, going to birthday parties and weddings, and just enjoying being alive at the moment.
In July of 1997, a CT scan picked up more tumor in her lungs. She was started on palliative chemo, but it did absolutely nothing to stop the progression of the disease. Her thirteenth birthday was in August, and by the end of that month it was getting harder to breath. Still she continued on as if nothing was wrong. She attended six days of eighth grade before having surgery to drain her left lung which was full of fluid. The morning of September 13th, after having spent a restless and wakeful night, she had a seizure and died in my arms.
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