christian is my 11 yr old son. he was diagnosed with severe aplastic anemia when he was 9 yrs. old. july 5 2006. the dr's thought it was leukemia at first but after a bone marrow biopsy and several blood test they made a final diagnosis. the symptoms are all the same as leukemia but there is technically no cancer. they dont treat with chemotherapy. the treatment is called atg they get the serum from animals and it is given over several hours a day for 5 days. christian had to have treatment twice, the first time he relapsed after 3 months. the first atg came from a rabbit and the second from a horse. the second time it seems to be working we are now trying to wean him off the cyclosporine. it has almost been a year since the last treatment and he goes to gainesville on the 12th and will have a biopsy on the 13th. were hoping to have his port taken out this summer he wants to play soccer. my grandfather died of lung cancer and i have an aunt who had several diffrent cancers but no known history of aplastic anemia or leukemia. we had no matches for transplant which is the only cure for this. this is why i want to get involved with relay for life. aplastic anemia is catergorized under cancer so anything i can do to help raise money for research i want to help. aplastic anemia is so rare that theres not much known about it. we need to raise awareness of the disease itself. thank you for your time missy dominguez