Take that, cancer! How this brave 9-year-old turned her fight into a fundraising effort.
This month, cancer took a $24,000 sock in the face courtesy of a 9-year-old’s sketchbook.
While fighting leukemia, 9-year-old Harper Harrell drew a ring of hearts and flowers, surrounded by a peace symbol wrapped in an orange ribbon.
“Peace Out Cancer,” it reads against a blue background.
Her design soon became a T-Shirt, thanks to Custom Ink, and her family donated half the proceeds from its sale to the V Foundation — netting a whopping $24,000 for cancer research.
“Peace out cancer means goodbye cancer,” said Harper. “I am very happy people are contributing.”
‘This isn’t easy’
The rising Durham fourth-grader has ample reason to celebrate. Since February, her scans have shown her to be cancer-free.
But since her diagnosis in October, Harrell has undergone rounds of chemotherapy that will continue into 2024 because acute lymphoblastic leukemia has a tendency to return.
“This isn’t easy,” she said in an interview Friday. “Treatment can be difficult. It makes you feel sick .. all sorts of things that you never thought you would feel. Sometimes you can’t identify the pain or anything else. Sometimes you just feel really different. It just makes you feel a bunch of different things.”
Her T-shirt can still be purchased at www.customink.com/fundraising/brave-like-harper-september-2022.
Harper continues to document her progress with photos, showing her surrounded by friends in matching blue shirts, raising peace signs.
For now, she enjoys her quiet time, hungrily reading the Amulet series. She isn’t back to school in-person yet, but the goal is November, and she has already proven her knack for meeting goals.
And while she keeps up her fight, she has an army of supporters locking arms around her, all decked out in flowery shirts.
This story is part of our regular “On the Bright Side” feature. Got a suggestion for a story that will bring a smile to our readers? E-mail Josh Shaffer at jshaffer@newsobserver.com.
This story was originally published August 22, 2022 at 11:23 AM.