LAS VEGAS (KLAS) — Eight-year-old Hayden Buckland loves Legos and spending time together with his household. With faculty proper across the nook, he is trying ahead to seeing his buddies once more.
At simply six years outdated, Hayden was recognized with Ewing Sarcoma, a sort of most cancers that impacts your bones and tissue. His mother, Gaila Buckland, mentioned that going again to high school at the start wasn’t simple for Hayden.
“Hayden got diagnosed when he was in kindergarten, so the last he knew of school was kindergarten which is all their learning skills like comprehension and reading or understanding,” Gaila Buckland mentioned.
Buckland mentioned her son missed all of first grade and underwent homebound education with a trainer twice per week for 2 hours. One other large problem was navigating physician appointments whereas Hayden was at college. At occasions, he must skip class to attend vital physician visits.
“Two hours wasn’t enough to catch him up to what a full day of school would teach him and going back now to second grade was definitely challenging for him and for us because we didn’t know exactly where he would be at, how far behind he would be scholarly and we had to push him a little bit more than usual,” Gaila Buckland added.
She mentioned, fortunately, they did not should undergo this transition alone.
Kimberly Kindig is the CEO of Candlelighters Childhood Most cancers Basis of Nevada, a nonprofit that gives monetary help, assist remedy, and high quality of life packages.
“We know that when a kiddo has been out of the classroom, there’s all of these big emotions and potential fears of returning to their classmates,” Kingdig defined. “Will I be accepted? Do I look differently? Am I emotionally prepared for the transition?”
“It’s super fun,” voiced Kindig. “There’s equine therapy, there’s arts and crafts and jiu jitsu and it’s how do we get these kiddos to navigate the challenges that come with childhood cancer. I think more times than not, not only the diagnosed child but the siblings, they feel really alone. They feel that they don’t really understand where they’re at. Our main goal is to normalize that and by surrounding them with other families and kids who really understand that, it really does help.”
Gaila Buckland mentioned Hayden is like one among his favourite characters “Wolverine” overcoming any impediment and displaying energy. Hayden will likely be getting into third grade for the 2025-2026 faculty yr.
“Going back to normal is difficult in general when you are going through cancer treatment with your child, but there is a rainbow at the end of that tunnel.” she mentioned.
Among the different packages supplied by the Candlelighters basis contains summer time camp, Vacation Undertake-A-Household, and the Thanksgiving Meal program. For extra info, click on right here.