Jocelyn Cornejo

Welcome to our CaringBridge website. We are using it to keep family and friends updated in one place. On Wednesday, January 18th,  it began with Jocelyn having flu like symptoms. I took her to the hospital and they diagnosed her with Thyroid Pneumonia. They gave her antibiotics and she felt better for a few days. On Saturday, January 21st, she complained of a headache. We gave her Tylenol and other over the counter medication and she felt better on Sunday. By Monday morning, I woke up and saw that Jocelyn's right eye was drooping. I immediately drover her to the hospital and Jocelyn had a seizure in the car. I pulled over the car and called 911. The ambulance took Jocelyn to Suburban hospital. In the ambulance she had 3 more seizures. They ran tests in the ER but could not control the seizures so Suburban sent her to Children's Hospital by ambulance. In the ER at Children's they sedated her and immediately took her for a CT Scan. They discovered a large tumor and told me that they would need to operate immediately to put a tube in her brain to drain the fluid. Jocelyn had a lot of fluid and pressure on her brain and they told me she would need surgery to remove the tumor on Thursday morning. She was in ICU until the surgery and although she did not have any more seizures, she had a small stroke and on Wednesday she was paralyzed on her left side. Thankfully, the surgery on Thursday morning, January 26th went very well and they removed all of the brain tumor. They took a biopsy of the tumor and sent it away for analysis. Jocelyn recovered very quickly and they sent her to a regular room on Saturday, January 28th. She continued to improve during the week. Unfortunately, the biopsy came back on Friday, February 3rd with a diagnosis of cancer. We are staying strong but it was hard news to hear.

Jocelyn came home on Monday, February 6th. The oncology doctors have conferred and even though they removed all of the tumor, they want Jocelyn to have radiation at the site of the tumor. It is a modern and very specific type of radiation that will be administered 5 days a week for 6 weeks at The University of Maryland. It is very important that this sweet little 4 year old stays very still while the radiation treatment is being given. As a result, they will first put a port into Jocelyn to administer anesthesia at every treatment so she will be asleep during the radiation. We expect the port to be surgically implanted in the next couple of weeks and radiation to begin in 3-4 weeks. While she is having radiation, and probably for a while afterwards, Jocelyn will also be having oral chemotherapy by pills on a daily basis.

We will keep you updates about Jocelyn's journey through this medical nightmare on this Caring Bridge site. Please leave us comments and words of encouragement. We ask for your prayers and positive thoughts to help Jocelyn to get better every day and beat this cancer. We have also set up a calendar for you to help us by bringing meals to the family. Jocelyn has 2 hungry and growing siblings that still need taking care of!

Lastly, insurance is not going to cover all of these medical costs or our costs for the 4 of us. I have had to quit my job to take care of Jocelyn and to take her to the daily radiation treatments over the next 2 months. We have stated a Go Fund ME site and we would appreciate any contributions that you can make //www.gofundme.com/jocelyns-medical-expenses-fund.

THANK YOU! We appreciate your support and words of hope and encouragement.