I took my son to the doctor for a temperature and now he is fighting for his life with stage four liver cancer: this is the symptom I missed

Vanessa HylandThe world was turned upside down after a routine visit to the doctor led to her two-year-old son, Lachlan, being diagnosed with stage 4 liver cancer.

The mother, from Queensland, previously lived a quiet life in Mount Cotton with her husband Shannon and their sons Jack, 7, and Lachie.

The 35-year-old had no cause for concern when baby Lachie came home from daycare with a fever, although she decided to take him to the pediatrician the next day for a medical clearance.

But the doctor immediately noticed the child’s “swollen” stomach – a sign that something sinister was going on – and ordered a battery of tests that revealed the potentially fatal cause: hepatoblastoma, a cancer that spreads in liver tissue.

“I hadn’t even realized anything was wrong,” Vanessa told FEMAIL. ‘He’s a child. They have big bellies. We went camping the weekend before and he was running around and happy. If I look closely, I can see the swelling, but it’s barely noticeable.’

“Fourteen days ago our lives were perfect and normal, and now we live in a children’s hospital and have a baby with liver cancer.”

The mother recalled being scared at the first doctor’s appointment.

“My heart jumped out of my chest when the doctor wanted to consult the head of the practice,” she said. ‘I could tell something was wrong.

‘They had blood tests done and an ultrasound done, and eventually told us that there were inflammatory markers that were concerning.

‘My whole world turned upside down when they found a mass on his liver that turned out to be a vascular tumor.’

Nine days after Lachie was first taken to the doctor, the toddler had to undergo surgery to have a central line inserted prior to six months of chemotherapy.

“Lachie will need liver reconstruction if they can shrink the tumor,” Vanessa said. “It’s all so terrible.”

Lachie’s prognosis is positive: the cancer is curable at this stage and the hope is that he will be better in six months.

‘We all pray, but you never know. The doctors cannot do a biopsy because they are afraid the tumor will bleed. But he has a good chance at a good life if we get through this.”

Although doctors estimated that the cancer had been growing for more than a year, the baby’s mild temperature after daycare was the first indication that something was wrong.

“He looks completely healthy, he was running around and screaming all the time,” the mother said.

Vanessa and Shannon are grateful to their friends and neighbors who brought food and helped with their daily lives.

“We don’t have much extended family. Shannon’s parents are deceased and mine live in Townsville. They helped Jack, but they must quickly return to their lives and work. We’re all on our own.’

One of the most difficult aspects of navigating Lachie’s diagnosis is explaining the situation to him.

‘The worst part is that we can’t tell Lachie what’s happening. When he went into surgery, he went down kicking and screaming. He wakes up with a line in his stomach and pain.

‘And then we have to fill him with chemo drugs. I hate that we have to subject our child to this. He keeps telling us he wants to go home and it’s hard to get him to stay.’

The parents have also been unable to explain the extent of the diagnosis to their seven-year-old child.

‘Jack knows Lachie is sick and that he needs doctors, but he doesn’t really know what it means to have advanced cancer.

‘We’ve bought him books and shown him videos, but Lachie looks fit and healthy, just as he has always been.’

Vanessa also revealed that the financial strain of the hospital stay and treatment will cripple the family for years.

“My husband and I are both on unpaid leave from work, but we really can’t afford that,” she said.

‘I don’t even want to think about the costs of everything after chemo.

‘I only worked four days a week and Lachie was a daycare center, but we certainly won’t be able to afford that in the coming years.

“It’s hard not to think about money right now, but we are very limited in our resources. We’re just trying to figure it out day by day at the moment.”

You can donate to help with Lachie’s treatment costs here.