On Good Friday in 2022, Mesa resident Kendyll McFarland was getting ready for an Easter holiday weekend with family and church friends.
However, when she went to change the diaper of her youngest son, Nash, who was 21 months old, she discovered a large bump under his rib cage. The next 72 hours became a crisis for the family. A pediatrician appointment led to a visit at the Phoenix’s Children’s Hospital, where imaging and tests eventually resulted in Nash being diagnosed with Hepatoblastoma, a cancer in the tissues of the liver, on Easter Sunday of all days.
For McFarland, who also had to leave the hospital at one point during that weekend and say goodbye to her father in hospice care before he passed away, the revelation that her youngest son had cancer was startling and hard for her to process.
