Volleyball Tournament, Auction to Honor Brownell Student, 14, Battling Cancer

Lucy Loch is in a far different mindset from that of her peers at Brownell Middle School. At 14, she is in the midst of receiving chemotherapy to fight her stage 3 Hodgkin's Lymphoma discovered in February.

She loves school. She misses school. And her friends.

Right now she spends most days at her Grosse Pointe Woods home, where she is keeping up on her schoolwork through Grosse Pointe Public's homebound program. Meanwhile, her three siblings are all in school throughout the day.

Resilient, however, Loch is making more friends and learning about a world she previously never really understood or needed to understand: children with cancer.

She recently made her friend Dylan a basket with goodies, including his favorite snack of Doritos, a blanket she made and another of his favorties, water-themed beanie babies, to celebrate his last chemotherapy treatment.

Loch is in her fourth round of chemotherapy through the Meade Pediatric Hematology Oncology Unit of the Van Elslander Cancer Center. In mid-May, she will find out how the chemotherapy has affected the softball-sized mass discovered in her chest Feb. 4 in an unexpected trip to the hospital.

What began as a pain in her arm--a pain so prevalent she skipped volleyball practice to go to the doctor--evolved into immediate admittance into the hospital and a bilateral biopsy.

Now the next step in her treatment is dependent upon the outcome of the scans she will undergo in mid-May. 

As Loch completes her fourth round of chemotherapy she is also being honored by her volleyball team, with whom she was able to play one tournament before having to halt her involvment for treatment.

The league she played with, Omni Volleyball Club, is organizing a tournament featuring volleyball games and a silent auction. The proceeds from the 'I Love Lucy Volleyball Tournament' will go to support the location where Loch has been receiving treatment--a decision she and her parents made together. 

They feel fortunate to have been overwhelmed by outpouring of support from family, friends, former and current teachers, and others--from regular delivery of meals, prayer blankets, gift baskets and more. Meanwhile, Loch said she's meeting other kids during treatment who are far less fortunate, and in some cases where their families cannot afford the treatment they need.

The pediatric unit where she is receiving treatment is small, with two doctors manning the caseload, and offers an intimate experience, the Lochs said. It also offers extras for the patients, such as the Bottomless Toy Chest, Lucy Loch said.

"It's truly like a family," her mother, Katie Loch said.

Additionally, it participates in a worldwide database collection system in which information from children with cancer is submitted with specificity as to the kind and location of cancer as a long-term tool to evaluate where such cases are arising and why.

Not even three months after being diagnosed, Lucy Loch wants to give back to the center where she has received treatment. The volleyball club organizers approached the Loch family about doing a fundraiser initially with the idea that the proceeds would benefit the family, but they want to help others. 

Kristen LaMagno, of Omni Volleyball Club, has recruited several volleyball teams from within her organization but also from other organizations in the area, she said. She is also working to get some adult teams together for the event.

The tournament, which is scheduled for May 15 at Brownell Middle School, is meant to be for fun and welcomes any skill level, she said. LaMagno has begun gathering items for the silent auction and is still working to secure corporate sponsorship for the event.

Local businesses have been supportive of the tournament and silent auction, many donating items, LaMagno said. Additionally, Brownell School officials donated use of the gymnasium, she said.

Open to the community, the 'I Love Lucy' event is from 4 to 9 p.m. There is not a set admission fee but a donation requested for entrance. 

The items available at the auction thus far include: 

• Tiger Tickets with an autographed baseball from Austin Jackson
• Jimmy Buffett concert tickets
• Michigan football tickets
• Lion tickets
• Jewelry
• Restaurant gift certificates
• Spa baskets
• A basket of cheer
• (2) free admissions to the Dan Griesbaum Baseball School

LaMagno said this is the first time she's ever planned such an event. She and her husband, Joe, live in Grosse Pointe Farms and founded the volleyball club a few years ago to help girls who wanted to play but did not want to travel as far as most of the travel leagues require. 

She was touched by Loch even in the short amount of time she got to know her early in the season, she said, describing Loch as kind and worthy of such efforts.

"I was surprised. I was happy. It was nice," Lucy Loch said of the tournament offering by her teammates and league organizers, noting she began to play volleyball in the fifth grade.

Life at the moment is far from normal but being around her friends, her mother said makes her feel more normal.

"Cancer brings out a lot of blessings," Katie Loch said. "Lucy's taught me about courage."

She remembers when Lucy was first in the hospital and the doctor noted she never asked about her hair. "He said, 'You never asked me the most important question,'" Katie Loch said of the doctor.

Lucy laughs as she recalls her response: "I can rock with a hat doctor."

In the coming weeks, Lucy will find out the next steps in her treatment. The cancerous mass in her chest was reduced by 60% when she went in for her first scans after she began chemotherapy, her mother said.

The doctors are "cautiosouly optimistic," Katie Loch said, noting if progress is seen on the scans, Lucy could be finished with chemotherapy. She will be monitored for the rest of her life, her mother said, noting the positive part of her daughter's particular diagnosis is that it can be cured.

"Cancer is such a powerful word," Katie Loch said. "It's a scary word but at the same time maybe not the scurge we think it is. Maybe it's the opportunity to see the goodness in people. It's really taught our family."

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