Brandon Werder

Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated in one place. We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement throughout his journey to beat cancer. 

Friday, March 22, 2019: The day our world was turned upside down and Brandon's life would forever be changed.

On a normal day, Brandon (6 years old) has boundless energy while playing nonstop and has a characteristic charming smile which is often followed by an infectious laugh.  But Brandon hadn't been feeling well since February.  It seemed to be Influenza at first with all his symptoms and a visit to urgent care concurred with that.  After about a week, the cough improved and went away but he couldn't seem to shake the fever and still seemed tired and down.  After on and off fevers for 3 weeks and a sick visit appointment with his pediatrician, this day proved to be anything but normal. With the duration of his fevers, Brandon was initially tested for strep, mono, had a  chest  x-ray and bloodwork done for a thorough analysis. We left the clinic and went home to rest and wait for the results.  The call came at 12:15pm.  The doctor said the tests came back negative but his bloodwork came back "all out of whack."  His hemoglobin was low (at 7 when it should be at 12), his platelets were low and his white blood cell count was high. Brandon was sent straight to Children’s Hospital in Minneapolis where a diagnosis of Leukemia was confirmed.  Our hearts sank and our tears flowed.  A Flow Cytometry test was done to determine that it was B-cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia or ALL.   

Leukemia.  That was it, the only word it took for our hearts to break and now our sweet little "B" (Brandon) has a journey to travel.  Thank you for visiting his site and for your prayers for B.