{"id":4,"date":"2020-04-27T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2020-04-27T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/cota1.wpengine.com\/cotaforirenenicole\/our-story\/"},"modified":"2020-04-27T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2020-04-27T00:00:00","slug":"our-story","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/our-story\/","title":{"rendered":"Our Story"},"content":{"rendered":"

Irene Nicole<\/span><\/em><\/p>\n

My name is Irene Nicole and I was diagnosed with Leukemia in March 2020 at only 18 years young. I had a regular active life as a Sophomore College Student, practicing Volleyball, Soccer, Track & Field and Water Polo. It all started with just a simple sore throat. After being sick a little over two weeks, a visit to Urgent Care, and taking antibiotics with no improvement; I was rushed to the Hospital. I was admitted with a severe neutropenia, anaemia and told my blood work was “wonky”. My bone marrow wasn’t producing anything. <\/span><\/p>\n

It all became a sudden nightmare, it all happened so fast. The hospital admitted me and my Mom was not allowed to be with me or even visit me due the COVID-19 pandemic and hospital protocol. The next day, they started to run many tests. I was never sick before, never even had a stitch. I was always so healthy and only ever had to do child well check ups. The hardest part was being there by myself and not understanding anything. I had to call my parents via FaceTime to be able to understand what the physicians were doing. I was very scared hearing the word Cancer, and not understanding why…? After a bone marrow biopsy it was confirmed, AML-MLL Leukaemia. Within a couple of days I was transferred to Moffit and reunited with my Mom.<\/span><\/p>\n

I was so scared and truthfully we all feared the worst outcome. But with courage and friends and family support, I have made up my mind. I am determined that I will beat this disease with positive thinking and complete trust in my transplant team. I must receive a few rounds of chemotherapy and undergo fertility preservation; then I will get my Bone Marrow transplant before the end of 2020. This is just the beginning of a new life and I’m glad to count on everyone’s support to get through and assure this disease is gone for good.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Children’s Organ Transplant Association (COTA) helps children and young adults who need a life-saving transplant by providing fundraising assistance and family support. COTA is the nation’s only fundraising organization solely dedicated to raising life-saving dollars in honor of transplant-needy children and young adults. 100% of each contribution made to COTA in honor of our patients helps meet transplant-related expenses. COTA’s services are free to our families, and gifts to COTA are tax deductible to the fullest extent of the law.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Irene Nicole My name is Irene Nicole and I was diagnosed with Leukemia in March 2020 at only 18 years young. I had a regular active life as a Sophomore College Student, practicing Volleyball, Soccer, Track & Field and Water Polo. It all started with just a simple sore throat. After being sick a little […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":5,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-4","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cota.org\/cotaforirenenicole\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}