A Langley family is raising money for medical and household bills as their child goes through his third round of cancer at the age of seven.
Kolbi MacPhee-Fraser was diagnosed with brain cancer at 16 months, again at the age of four.
As of January 2019, his aunt Rebecca Fraser said Kolbi was thought to be cancer-free.
“Our family could not have been happier,” she said in a GoFundMe the family has launched. “That was until we were blindsided in February.”
READ MORE: Funds south to help South Surrey boy battling cancer for second time
Lower back pain hit Kolbi, and his father Nick and step-mother Jamey-Lyn Brown took him to Vancouver Children’s Hospital for an MRI. The cancer had returned, with tumours pressing on Kolbi’s spine.
“We were told there were no curative options,” said Rebecca Fraser.
Despite this, by August Kolbi was doing better, and he was able to start Grade One at a new school in Langley, where the family moved in the last year.
Hip pain returned for Kolbi later in the year, however, and the tumour’s impact has paralyzed his legs and now prevents Kolbi from walking.
“Kolbi went in for an emergency MRI to see if palliative radiation for pain management was an option, and then he went for a CT scan,” said Rebecca Fraser. “At the CT scan Kolbi had a very hard time waking up from anaesthesia. Every time oxygen was taken off his stats would drop. At one point while the oxygen was still on Kolbi stopped breathing.”
Kolbi was transferred to the Canuck’s Place Children’s Hospice and has done another round of five radiation treatments, his aunt reports.
The GoFundMe is aimed at raising money for the family, as Nick has hardly been able to take shifts at work in recent years as he cared for Kolbi and the rest of the family, said Rebecca Fraser.
The family already launched a successful fundraiser in early 2019, which enabled the family to pay bills and take some final trips, including to Disneyland.
To contribute to the GoFundMe, visit https://www.gofundme.com/f/t7n22-supporting-kolbi-and-family.