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Day Child receiving treatment in Seattle
Waylon Day Child holds a sign saying "One Mile" on which he wrote that he walked 17 miles on the eighth floor of the University of Washington Medical Center, where he is receiving treatment for an aggressive form of cancer. His wife, Terissa Oats, said he walked 25 miles in the center in the first three weeks he was there. Fundraisers are set this Thursday at Taco John's in Havre and at Havre's Pizza Hut the following Thursday, Aug. 3, to help Day Child with his expenses.
Havre Daily News staff
A local man has fundraisers set to help him pay for extensive treatment for cancer in Seattle.
A Crunch for a Cause fundraiser at Taco John's is set for Thursday to help Waylon Day Child of Rocky Boy, who is fighting the aggressive form of cancer extrandol NK T-cell lymphoma. Another fundraiser is set at Havre's Pizza Hut Thursday, Aug. 3.
Day Child's wife, Terissa Oats, said he is responding well to treatment, but the family still is in for a long haul.
"Everything is looking a lot better, but we'll be down here another three or four months," she said in a telephone interview.
His mother, Noreen Day Child, said her son has Medicaid benefits to help pay for the treatment, and the Rocky Boy Health Department also is helping, but the expenses and loss of wages are adding up.
She said he is a hard worker, and has been with Rainbow Irrigation for 15 years but has been unable to work for some time.
"He just turned 35 July 12," she said.
Oats said if she hadn't taken him to the hospital when she did, after several months of his feeling ill - he was weak and nauseous and had ulcers on his skin - it would have been too late.
He was diagnosed with the lymphoma at Benefis Hospital in Great Falls and was flown to Seattle for treatment.
She said the cancer had spread significantly before it was diagnosed.
"The cancer was eating his liver, his skin and his lungs," she said. "It was on his upper body area and slowly moving down to his legs."
The treatment seems to be helping, Oats said.
"He's doing a whole lot better," she said.
Oats said being in Seattle makes it hard to see their family - Tyra, 13, Jalissa, 11, Kalissa, 4, and Waylon Jr., 2 - but family members bring the children to visit when possible.
Waylon Day Child's aunt, Vera Jaramillo, said the money from the fundraisers will help with the cost of the children visiting their parents.
He deserves the help, she said.
"Waylon Day Child is a family man," she said in an email. "When called upon for help, he is there in an instant and without hesitation to assist whoever is in need."
Oats said the medical staff at the University of Washington Cancer Center have said they were amazed at how well he responded to the chemotherapy.
"The doctors all said that they never seen someone actually get up and start walking right after chemo," she said.
" ... His body is strong enough to help with the chemo to fight with the cancer and kill it."
She said he completed his last set of chemotherapy and is scheduled for a stem cell transplant Aug. 22. Regardless of how well the chemo went and how the transplant goes, she said, the doctors will want to keep Day Child under observation for some time.
She said she is trying to get an account set up at Wells Fargo for the fundraising efforts - an account is set up at Independence Bank but it has no branch in Seattle.
Thursday from 5 to 7 p.m., people who make a purchase at Taco John's can say they are donating to Waylon Day Child's Crunch for a Cause benefit and 50 percent of the purchase will go to his fundraiser.
The following Thursday, Aug. 3, people purchasing any food from the Havre Pizza Hut all day can say they are donating to him, and 20 percent of the purchase price will go to the fundraiser.
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