{"id":7923,"date":"2020-03-16T15:28:27","date_gmt":"2020-03-16T04:28:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/?p=7923"},"modified":"2020-03-16T15:28:27","modified_gmt":"2020-03-16T04:28:27","slug":"brave-little-battler-on-the-hop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/brave-little-battler-on-the-hop\/","title":{"rendered":"Brave little battler on the hop"},"content":{"rendered":"

Story featured in the Sunday Herald Sun.<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n

Words:\u00a0<\/strong>Alanah Frost<\/p>\n

Photography:\u00a0<\/strong>Alex Coppel<\/p>\n

For Mackenzie Butterworth\u2019s mum Tanya, dressing her little girl is one of the only things she can still control in her daughter\u2019s life.<\/p>\n

The 2\u00bd-year-old was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia seven months ago, after her parents noticed bruises appearing on her legs.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe\u2019d been unwell with viruses for a few months beforehand and I just put it down to being at daycare,\u201d Ms Butterworth said. \u201c(Dad) Brenton googled the symptoms, to the point where he was crying, and they matched leukaemia so I took her to the hospital.\u201d<\/p>\n

The diagnosis turned the Ballarat family\u2019s life upside down. \u201cThe first month she spent in hospital, at the Royal Children\u2019s Hospital, and my husband would come and visit on weekends with the kids,\u201d Ms Butterworth said. \u201cAnother phase was eight weeks in Melbourne. And the one she has just finished (the third phase) was probably the worst ever \u2014 she spent pretty much all of December in hospital having oral chemotherapy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tomorrow Mackenzie will start another round of treatment, which will continue for the next two years. But running through the grass outside the hospital, dressed in a bright pink tutu and a bunny-ear headband, Mackenzie\u2019s fighting spirit shines through. \u201cShe\u2019s been amazing,\u201d Ms Butterworth said. \u201cShe\u2019s been through a lot. But most of the time she\u2019s happy and playful. It\u2019s really incredible to watch a child that\u2019s being put through absolute hell who still manages to smile.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Good Friday Appeal, which runs in the lead-up to Easter, will raise much-needed funds for kids like Mackenzie. The Herald Sun\/Transurban Run for the Kids, which raises funds for the appeal, will not go ahead because of public health concerns over coronavirus.<\/p>\n

To make a donation to the Good Friday Appeal, head to the website<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Good Friday Appeal: Mackenzie, 2, about to start her Chemotherapy treatment. Picture: Alex Coppel.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mackenzie Butterworth was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukaemia seven months ago, after her parents noticed bruises appearing on her legs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":195,"featured_media":7924,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8971,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7923","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-in-the-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7923","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/195"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7923"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7923\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7932,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7923\/revisions\/7932"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7924"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7923"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7923"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7923"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}