Beatrice Siwek Beatrice Siwek's Journey

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. Thank you for visiting.


Please keep Beatrice ("Bea") close to your hearts & in your thoughts. She is the sweetest, strongest, and smartest little two year old girl that you could ever hope to meet.


 On Sat November 19 after a trip to the emergency room for some unexplained vomiting, Bea was diagnosed with a brain tumor on her cerebellum. She was immediately transferred via ambulance to Lurie Children's Hospital in downtown Chicago where she underwent emergency brain surgery the next morning. Due to the large size and delicate location of the tumor, the surgery lasted for ten hours.

After surgery, Bea remained in the pediatric intensive care unit for several days and was transferred to the pediatric neurosurgery floor on Wednesday Nov 23rd. She is recovering with an external drain in her head that is relieving any swelling and extra fluid on her brain. 


She has slowly begun to eat food and drink water. She has sat up in bed a few times but it is very tiring. She will begin physical & occupational therapy to help get her little body back on track.


The family is still awaiting the final pathology results but initially she has been diagnosed with a medulloblastoma brain tumor. Unfortunately, Beatrice has a long treatment road ahead of her that will involve inpatient rehabilitation and chemotherapy. They will be meeting with the Neuro oncology team at Lurie as soon as the final pathology results are available. Hopefully early next week.

In all, Beatrice has had a 10 hr brain surgery, ICU for 3 days, pediatric neurosurgery floor for 2 weeks, possibly one more surgery, multiple MRIs, therapies, 1-2 weeks inpatient rehab at the Rehab Institution Chicago, then inpatient chemotherapy with central IV line placed. She has endured much but her strength and resilience is quite amazing to witness. 

Joe, Laura, Beatrice, and Bernadette are so grateful for all of your kind messages of support and love for their family. They want to thank you from the bottom of their hearts. Please check back for updates on Bea's progress.