Community raises funds for Salmon Arm girl with rare cancer

Halle Krawczyk is a star gymnast, a comedian, a best friend, a sister, a daughter — and a fighter.

Halle has a rare form of cancer called chordoma that occurs in the bones at the base of the skull and in the spine.

“Hers (tumours) are in the C1 and C2 and the clivus area,” said Matt Krawczyk, Halle’s Dad. “There’s a major tumour there and she had a lung metastasis straight off the bat.”

The Chordoma Foundation says that chordomas are “complicated tumours to treat because of critical structures such as the brain stem, spinal cord, important nerves and arteries.”  There is also a 30 to 40 per cent chance that the tumours can come back after treatment.

“Getting diagnosed, that was really hard,” said Halle Krawczyk,12.

Fewer than 100,000 people are living with chordoma and fewer than 300 patients are diagnosed with chordoma each year.

“We had been bringing her in for three and a half years before the diagnosis and doctors missed it,” said Carolyn Krawczyk, Halle’s Mom.

The family realized something was wrong when Halle started taking gymnastics lessons. Her neck started to hurt and she was regularly complaining about migraines. But the 12-year-old worked through the pain and still performed in some events.

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“I would get pain in my neck and it just really hurt but I always went to gymnastics even when it hurt,” Halle said.

“I am a competitive gymnast. My favourite thing is the bar, and on beam, you can do flips, but I usually do back walkovers, cartwheels and handstands. It’s really fun.”

The last three years of the Krawczyk’s lives have been consumed by road trips to Vancouver and to the U.S. to see specialists and receive immunotherapy, chemotherapy and other treatments.

Two years ago, they went to the National Institutes of Health and then the National Cancer Institute in the U.S., Matt Krawczyk said.

“There’s a Chordoma Foundation and she is part of a study, and there are doctors that know her cancer better than everyone else in the world and we have been doing everything they want to,” he said. “All these treatments are starting to fail so the next step is a major surgery.”

The surgery is a chance for a fresh start, as it could remove at least 95 per cent of the tumour on Halle’s spinal cord.

The surgery could happen just before Christmas so the family decorated early just in case they are in Philadelphia as Halle recovers over the holidays.

With medical bills mounting and the life-saving surgery fast approaching, a family friend has started a fundraiser to ease some of the financial pressure, and family, friends and complete strangers have been showing their support for the young gymnast.

“It’s overwhelming. The amount that things are going for is out of this world,” Carolyn Krawczyk said. “It’s just nice to know that people care.”

“It makes you want to cry when you see someone giving,” Matt Krawczyk said. “It’s humbling.”

After the surgery, which involves metal being put in her neck, Halle might not be able to do gymnastics anymore. Yet she has an idea of what she would like to try next after she has made a full recovery.

“I won’t be able to do crazy gymnastics anymore so that’s going to be weird and hard,” Halle said. “Maybe if I can, I will do dance because I still want to do sports. I just can’t do crazy ones.”

For more information visit the family’s donation page.