My toddler had a fever and wouldn’t eat - then doctors told me she had leukemia

“I honestly don’t think I will ever comprehend how intense the situation was,” Mum Tenneil says of her daughter’s diagnosis. 

It was February 2017 when Tenneil noticed her 17-month-old daughter, Audrey, acting differently than usual.

She was vomiting, had a fever that wouldn’t budge, and she refused to eat or sleep. 

Neither Panadol nor Nurofen would keep her temperature down.

Tenneil and her husband, Tom, thought it was just a “nasty” 24-hour bug, but after two days, Audrey showed no signs of improvement.

It was a tiring ordeal, and with no sleep, Tom and Tenneil drove Audrey around in the car to try and get her to rest. 

“Audrey proceeded to start projectile vomiting and was burning up,” the mum-of-two told Kidspot. They rushed her to Katoomba Hospital in NSW.

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“Doctors told me it was leukemia”

A nurse asked about a “funny noise’ Audrey was making, something Tenneil had only noticed that day.

“Turns out she was tachycardic,” she explained, meaning her heart was beating too fast. Racing at 180 beats per minute, the medical team rushed her in and did blood tests. 

“Initially, they thought she had meningitis,” Tenneil said. Two lumbar punctures later, they had no answer, but the paediatrician kept looking; his gut told him something was wrong. 

“I’m so grateful he trusted his instincts,” she said. 

Audrey was transferred to Westmead Children’s Hospital, where for the next week, she was subjected to endless tests and a bone marrow biopsy. 

“It’s not good,” the doctors told Tenneil and Tom. “It's leukemia.” 

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Audrey was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia, an extremely rare blood cancer. Source: Supplied

“I don’t think I’ll ever comprehend how intense the situation was”

Audrey was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia (AML), an extremely rare form of blood cancer that’s not normally seen in children, let alone female toddlers.  

“At the time, I was told only 40 children a year are diagnosed with AML, and of those diagnosed, are mainly male and closer to adulthood,” Tenneil said. 

The more common form of blood cancer, acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), has a survival rate of 90 per cent with treatment. At the time, Audrey’s survival rate was somewhere between 30 and 40 per cent. 

“We were completely devastated,” Tenneil shared. “I honestly don’t think I will ever comprehend how intense the situation was.” 

Audrey began an “extremely high dose” of chemo, which made her terribly sick. She was constantly vomiting, had horrific diarrhoea, and her hair began falling out. 

“I didn’t have it in me to shave her head,” Tenneil confessed. “By the last round of chemo, it had all fallen out by itself as well as her eyebrows and lashes.” 

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Audrey, now seven, is medically cured of AML. Source: Supplied

The letter that changed it all

Three weeks into treatment, her blood count began to regenerate. “The chemo was doing its job,” she told Kidspot. If Audrey continued responding to treatment the way she was, she didn’t need a bone marrow transplant. 

Audrey was in the hospital for nearly six months, Tenneil sleeping by her side six nights a week. 

“I don’t think my brain ever really comprehended how bad the situation was because I had to hold it together for Audrey and Tom,” she said. 

Audrey completed her treatment in July 2017. For the next six months, she had fortnightly blood tests, which eventually slowed down to three tests per year. 

Last year in July, Audrey’s GP sent Tenneil and Tom a copy of a letter from her oncologist. 

Audrey was medically cured. 

“I sobbed for about 40 minutes just staring at the letter,” she told Kidspot. “I honestly didn’t realise how much of an impact seeing it in writing would have.” 

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Audrey is now seven years old, and thankfully she was too young to remember the treatment. 

“We do talk about it if prompted, but I’m very much of the mind that we don’t dwell on the past,” Tenneil explained. “I didn’t want it to define who she was as a person.”

Now Tenneil is raising awareness for the Australian Cancer Research Foundation (ACRF). 

“Research is the only way to find a cure or better treatments for patients,” she said. “Without funds, they simply can’t improve the results that we currently have for all cancers.” 

Tenneil, who runs her own "busy little salon" in Blaxland, will take part in the Real Insurance Sydney Habour 10k, which takes place on 23rd July, raising vital funds for the ACRF.

She's not only doing the race for Audrey but for her salon clients who were recently diagnosed with cancer. 

"I wanted to do something to show my support for them as well."

Originally published as My toddler had a fever and wouldn’t eat - then doctors told me she had leukemia