A Girl Named Spike

Spike: a cute little girl who has been baby of the family, then middle child, and finally oldest child of our family!

She will surely one day stump psychologists who study birth order and personality.

Spike is the nickname my husband gave our beautiful daughter when she was a baby. Now, at 14, she despises the name. Someday, it may be forgotten (she hopes), so I am preserving it here.

She was born my fourth child and 2nd daughter in 1994. She came out red and screaming with a tough look on her face that said, “Don’t mess with me”. She was the adored baby of the family with older siblings who held her and made her every wish come true for the first 23 months of her life.

Then, one month short of her 2nd birthday, our family’s life was changed forever when her 4 year old brother, Daniel was diagnosed with ALL. A form of leukemia that is many times curable in children was aggressive and became resistant to therapy in Daniel.

We left Spike asleep in her bed in the middle of the night with a dear friend to stay with her, while we drove Daniel to a facility over 2 hours away for treatment. A week later, when we returned with a very ill little boy, Spike had lost her place as the baby of the family. Daniel then, justifiably, received the family’s “baby” status.

However, 2 years later, when Daniel’s leukemia returned, Spike was tested and found to be a perfect match for a bone marrow transplant for her brother. She, bravely, at 4 years of age, took a series of painful shots to build up her white blood cells, and gave many large blood samples before finally going to surgery to have bone marrow extracted from her hips for her brother’s transplant. Suddenly she was the hero of the family and especially of her brother. He bought little gifts to give her every time she donated blood or got a shot, or in any way endured medical treatment on his behalf.

The bone marrow transplant did take, and did hold the leukemia at bay for a couple of years, but when it returned again, Spike stepped up to the plate in a bigger way. She donated whole blood in large volumes on a monthly basis, which the medical professionals gave to Daniel in an experimental treatment called donor leukocyte infusion. They called it salvage therapy. We called it doing whatever we could for our son. Spike called it enduring many blood donations in exchange for beloved stuffed animals.

This went on for a year until the doctors determined that Spike’s blood was “too nice” to Daniel’s leukemia and it wasn’t able to give him a cure.

About this time, we had another baby boy, who then permanently took Spike’s place as the baby of the family, and Spike had also lost her place as heroine of the family, as her blood was no longer needed for Daniel.

Two years later, we lost Daniel to leukemia 3 days after another baby boy was born into our family. She was suddenly a middle child between 2 older siblings and 2 younger siblings, all alone on the family tree without a close in age sibling. She and Daniel had been very close in age, as well as close because of her being part of his treatment plan. They had also been classmates, as we homeschooled them together. It will take another post to describe the difficulties that came of homeschooling her alone for the next 4 years!

Within a year of losing Daniel, our 2 oldest children both moved out on their own, to their own apartments, and went off to college life, while still in town. Suddenly, Spike was the oldest girl with 2 little brothers in our family.

In the past 4 years, she has grown into a beautiful young lady, who is a wonderful big sister to her 2 little brothers. She also enjoys hanging out with her 2 older siblings whenever she can.

She started feeling especially alone the past couple of years; homeschooling alone, and being the only girl left in our family. She had plenty of friends and outside activities, but as she entered the teen years, it became more and more apparent that she needed more of a social life with other teens who were also being homeschooled. Most of her friends had either always gone to public school, or had moved away from this area, or were entering public or private school for high school. After much prayer and searching, we founded Teen Scene! Check out my previous post on Teen Scene.