Meet Sawyer!
Less than a year later, the tumor was back. Another surgery, 4 rounds of chemo, and back to wait and watch. And then exactly a year later she relapsed again. She was put on a trial. It failed. More surgery, this time full brain, and spine radiation. Sawyer floated through all of this with so much integrity and will. She was anti symptomatic and besides her sweet bald head... no one would ever guess that she was fighting such an evil beast within. We went almost two years of no signs of disease! The hope we had was strong and we felt like prayers were being answered and sadly, then it was back. This time St. Jude had no options left for us. We tried hospitals all over the country.
In May of 2020, the tumors had spread throughout her spine and for the first time, she was in pain due to her cancer. We decided to let her have the very best quality of life that we could give her.. and this meant no more treatments. Sawyer fought for exactly half of her life. She died peacefully in her mother’s arms with her family and friends surrounding her on December 31, 2020.
Sawyer loved all things mermaids, fairies, kitties, and unicorns. She loved Roblox and Minecraft! But what she loved most of all was her parents, grandparents, and her 2 sisters and 2 brothers. She brought joy to everyone around her. Sawyer loved making others feel happy ... she loved making notes, cards, and inspirational quotes for her family and friends! Her name and beautiful spirit will never be forgotten. One of her best quotes was “be brave. Be bold. Be you” And that’s how we will honor her legacy.. by #livinglikesawyer
Sawyer Grace Perkins was born on July 13, 2010. She entered this world as beautiful as could be and with fire in her soul. She was smart, witty, and incredibly feisty... which we found out were all the qualities she would need to fight when she was diagnosed at 5.5 on April 23, 2016, with anaplastic ependymoma.
Sawyer grew up perfectly healthy so it was quite shocking to find out she had two large tumors growing in her brain. This was all found after she had been throwing up quite often in the morning and her eyes beginning to cross. She had a 10-hour surgery the next day where they were able to remove the entire tumor and then began radiation a few weeks later at St. Jude hospital. After the 6 weeks of radiation... we were on a wait-and-watch plan. Scans every 3 months.