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Justin Langston
Staff Writer
The annual Piedmont Schools DUCK week to raise funds to help someone in need is just around the corner and this year, the recipient is Piedmont Elementary fifth grader Colby Henrichs.
Henrichs is suffering from Acute Lymphocytic Leukemia (ALL) and is currently undergoing chemotherapy.
This year’s theme for the annual event is “Duck Week Studios” celebrating the films of Disney and their computer animation studio Pixar.
“I never thought that someone I loved would get cancer, but when I got the news that my son Colby could have leukemia, my heart broke,” Colby’s mother, Cheryl Henrichs, told school district officials.
Henrichs was diagnosed with ALL in late March 2008 when he was just a third grader. Almost immediately, he began an intensive five-week chemotherapy session, which began his three year road to recovery.
Currently in the final maintenance stage of treatment, Henrichs goes to the hospital twice a week to have a chemotherapy injection and to check is blood count. In addition, Henrichs must take an oral chemotherapy pill every night and needs to take a steroid treatment for five days out of every month.
Beyond that, he must undergo a regular spinal tap every three months to make sure his spinal fluid is free of leukemia.
“It is very hard for me to see him lying in a hospital bed when he is so sick and I can’t make it better, and when he is getting the spinal and is crying because he is hurting,” his mother said.
ALL is also known as “cancer of the white blood cells” and it causes malignant, immature white blood cells to over multiply within bone marrow.
The disease causes death by overcrowding the bone marrow and pushing out strong white blood cells in favor of the weaker ones.
It is extremely lethal and can kill those afflicted with it within weeks if gone untreated.
It also mostly affects children, as 3,000 out of 4,000 of those stricken with the disease annually within the United States are children.
Fortunately, however, it has an 85 percent survival rate among children and half of adults have long term, disease free lives.
However, the cost of treating the disease is enormous, and not just fiscally. Because of this, the Piedmont School District looks to raise over $100,000 during this year’s DUCK week to help Henrichs and his family get through his treatment, which will continue until June 4 of next year.
The theme, “DUCK Week Studios” comes from the messages about pulling together as a community and encouraging others to sacrifice to help those in need as put forth by Disney/Pixar films like “Toy Story” and DreamWorks Animation’s “Madagascar.”
DUCK week’s tagline, is “You’ve Got a Friend In Me,” It comes from the song of the same name from the original “Toy Story.”
Those who wish to donate to DUCK Week this year can participate in the events running at the schools from March 8-12, or if anyone has questions, they can contact the high school at 373-5011.
Those interested in helping can also click on the DUCK Week link at www.piedmontschools.org for more information.
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