Alexis Metott

My name is Alexis Metott. I’m 12 years old and enjoy kayaking, camping, fishing, hunting, listening to music, and playing the clarinet. On March 30, 2013, my life was changed when I was rushed to Upstate Golisano Children’s Hospital with an excruciating headache and seizures. Once I arrived scans showed that I had a brain tumor.

After the tumor was found, I had emergency surgery. I could have died either way, but I made it. It took almost two weeks to diagnose me, but doctors discovered that I had a pilomyxoid astrocytoma cancer. I was the 35th case in the WORLD.

In total, I was in the hospital for 26 days. Twelve days in the pediatric ICU, 5 days in 11G and 9 days in 2 North for rehab. During this time I had 2 MRIs, x-rays, daily blood draws, and earned 103 beads of courage. There were a lot of rough spells, but the nurses at the hospital helped me a lot. I had a lot of visitors and prayers in the hospital, especially from one of my friends who had different diagnosis of brain cancer. She came to visit and told me about what to expect while recovering from surgery and what treatment is like in case I needed it, but so far I haven’t.

Now it’s 2014 and things are kind of getting better. I’ve had two more surgeries since last March. In September of last year, I had a shunt placed to release a pressure build up of fluid. Then in March, I had a shunt revision because it got plugged. Every three months, I have an MRI to make sure that my tumor hasn’t grown back or anything. I like to participate in the walk to raise money for the hospital so myself and all the other kids that have to be there have fun things to do.