Community Corner

'Little Fighter' Beats Odds, So Far

Ty Louis Campbell, 3, is fighting for his life—and his parents and family members are in the thick of it with him.

In 11 months, one Pawling family’s world has turned upside down.

Last August, now 3-and-a-half-year-old Ty Louis Campbell was a seemingly happy, healthy toddler. But he had yet to sleep through the night. He would whine and moan as he lay in his child-size bed, sometimes complaining of a headache. Most of the time his parents could not figure out what was wrong.

Today, that little boy has roughly a dozen scars scattered across his 26-pound body. He has a shunt in his skull and a history of major surgeries accompanied by seemingly endless check-ups, radiation and chemotherapy appointments. His latest challenge is a somewhat insatiable appetite — thanks to steroids that have magnified his hunger and chemo that has dulled his taste buds.

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Doctors diagnosed Ty with an extrarenal rhabdoid tumor, a very rare and aggressive cancer, after eight-straight sleepless night and a spontaneous visit to the emergency room.

Ty’s parents, Lou and Cindy Campbell, expected to walk out of the hospital that day with doctors telling them that they were just being over-concerned, crazy parents.

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That’s the vibe that they had gotten from their pediatrician in the past. After all, Ty had met every milestone and almost always wore a smile.

Still, the couple felt like they needed some kind of extra assurance that their first-born was fine — so they went with their gut after the string of sleepless nights.

They stayed overnight at Cohen Children’s Medical Center in New Hyde Park, as they were living in Long Island at the time. They slept in the hospital and spent two days waiting for an MRI. Because Ty was so young, he had to go under anesthesia, which required a pediatric specialist.

Lou, 39, and Cindy, 35, could have waited another week or two for an open appointment, but after staying the night, they just wanted to get the MRI over with.

When the time for the test came, the couple started packing their bags. Ty had slept “like a baby” that night in the hospital, Cindy said, and during the day he was his happy self — jumping on the bed and playing with his toy cars.

“Everyone thought we were crazy, because he was like this totally, healthy kid,” Cindy said, remembering back to that August day. Her husband had his bags in his hands when he saw the neurologist coming and stepped into the hall. He popped his head back in the room and told his wife, “We’ve got to go, it’s bad.”

“They take us to a conference room, nobody has the code to get us into the room and people are coming that I’ve never seen before, like a social worker, and my husband just said ‘Just tell us here in the hall, we just want to know, this is ridiculous,’” Cindy recalled. “And this one tough nurse was like ‘We’re getting you in a conference room, this isn’t something we’re just going to tell you in the hallway.’ It was horrible.”

After the first surgery and an initially incorrect diagnosis, the Campbells learned that Ty’s cancer is one of the most aggressive kinds. Doctors said that the “personality” of a rhabdoid tumor — which was growing off Ty’s skull bone, something they had never seen before — usually means patients have six months to live.

Since that diagnosis 11 months ago, Ty’s cancer has metastasized. He has had two additional tumor resections: One to remove the initial tumor after it grew back and another late last month to remove what Cindy described as two lesions in Ty’s cerebellum.

Ty is slated to start radiation this week, following last month’s surgery. His parents hope that all the family has been through in the last 11 months — a move to Pawling so that Ty and his younger brother Gavin would have more space and Lou, a Mahopac native, would have more work-flexibility; a trip to Disney World, thanks to the Make a Wish Foundation; a leave from work for Cindy; days away from Gavin, who often stays with family members while his parents sleep at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center; as well as Ty’s regressed speech, inability to walk and perpetual pain — will soon be in the past.

Doctors have not been encouraging. While no one has given the Campbells a prognosis in terms of days, months or years, once the cancer has metastasized, it will likely continue to do so.

Still, Lou and Cindy’s gut-instincts have often been spot on. At one point, doctors were treating Ty for diarrhea when his parents insisted he had an infection in his central nervous system — again. Doctors later realized Lou and Cindy were right when Ty’s shunt swelled.

The couple is praying that hopes for their “little fighter” to beat the cancer become reality.

“I’m not unrealistic, I know what we’re dealing with here,” Cindy told Patch last week while she walked around the house with a moaning Ty on her hip. He has been unable to walk since November. “There are definite cases, there are people that have stage-four cancer that survive … We want him to have a good life, and maybe that’s a possibility still, and there’s no reason we shouldn’t always hope for that, because you never know.”

Cindy compared the hope for a cancer-free future to getting struck by lightning.

“It happens,” she said as she told Ty’s story with a smile on her face, pulling out all the stops to try and find something to satisfy her little boy’s hunger.

Cindy spoke in a soft voice, asking “What is it, baby?” as she stood looking into the pantry. She rattled off a laundry list of suggestions — turkey roll-ups, animal crackers, a buttered roll, noodles, pretzels sticks, “chippies,” a bucket of candy and much more.

Finally, Ty agreed to an extra-large marshmallow.

“We do this all day,” she whispered with a smile.

Ty showed his appreciation when he called out from the couch in the slurred speech his mother has mastered.

“Momma, I love you.”

Lou’s sister, Debi Fossati, says that even with the pain, Ty’s happy spirit is still there. She sat with her nephew the day before his last surgery, blowing bubbles together while Ty cackled and sang Spider Man songs.

“He’s already beaten the odds so many times, I don’t think they [doctors] know what to say anymore,” Fossati said. “He just keeps fighting … Until he stops, we have to try everything we can.”

For more information on Ty, read his mother’s blog.


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