Communities rally after Libby boy's cancer diagnosis

While Libby high school students loaded the bleachers last week to cheer on the football team, they also broadcast their allegiance to a recently formed posse: Team Kiye.

“We just think it’s amazing,” Eryn Jenkins said Wednesday from a Spokane hospital. “We are just shocked and we really appreciate the way everyone’s banded together.”

On Aug. 23, Eryn’s son, Kiye, was diagnosed with stage-four Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. About a week earlier, Kiye had shown a lump on his neck to his father, Dan, who said he didn’t think much of it. Eryn, an Air Force medic for five years and an EMT at St. John’s (now Cabinet Peaks Medical Center) for eight, wanted further inspection and brought her son to get tested at medical centers in Libby, Kalispell, and eventually Spokane where doctors completed a CT scan and a biopsy that revealed the stage-four cancer riddled across 50 percent of his abdomen and chest.

Stage four, Eryn said, is the worst possible diagnosis regarding Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. According to the American Cancer Society, the five-year survival rate for stage four Hodgkin’s is about 65 percent.

On Tuesday, Kiye turned 13 years old at Sacred Heart Children’s Hospital in Spokane, Wash., where he began chemotherapy the next day.

“It’s been really fast,” she said.

Perhaps just as fast has been the reaction from the Jenkins’s community. The high school students weren’t alone in showing their support with signs that read “#TeamKiye,” as area businesses last week began posting their own signs of encouragement.

“That’s small town America,” Dan said. “There aren’t rock concerts in town and crazy things all the time but there sure is a benefit to living in a small town and I’ve felt that all my life here.”

Dan said as a parent, he’s clearly scared. He said the heavy-heart feeling induced by commercials depicting children without hair after chemotherapy has given way to an entire new weight in his chest. But between the community support and compassion from the doctors at Sacred Heart, Dan said optimism doesn’t feel entirely out of reach.

“My family and I cannot express in words how grateful we are to the community and the people here,” Dan said. “The doctors, the way they handle rough news and connect with the kids, they’re really amazing.”

In the two weeks since he showed his parents that lump, Eryn said Kiye’s bravery has kept the family ship afloat amidst a flood of tears and concern.

“He’s an inspiration to us all,” she said. “He keeps saying, ‘Why are you crying? Crying don’t help.’ He’s an amazing little boy. He’s scared, but he’s amazing.”

Kiye was actually born in Spokane. When he was three months old, his family moved to Libby, where Eryn grew up and down the road from where Dan grew up, in Troy. Kiye now has a younger brother, Zhane, who is 10.

Eryn said Kiye is a popular kid in the area. He plays on several sports teams, including football, where his dad is a coach. Two of his friends have already shaved their heads, she said, to support Kiye’s chemotherapy. Eryn said local businesses have already begun reaching out with ideas to help with travel costs as the family now looks ahead to commuting back and forth to Spokane for Kiye’s chemotherapy rounds.

Team Kiye has also taken to social media, where friends have voiced support in aggregated posts collected by the hashtag, #TeamKiye. There’s also a GoFundMe site, “Kiye Jenkins Medical Expenses,” where just 53 people have already donated $5,135 to help foot the medical bill. The goal for the webpage is $10,000.

The GoFundMe page was set up by Robyn Paulson, Eryn’s sister and a counselor for the school district in Bigfork. Eryn said a large amount of the donated funds have come from Paulson’s people in the Flathead Valley, essentially bringing the two communities together to help Jenkins’s family.

“To have two communities involved now, it’s just kind of a shock,” she said.

Paulson was not available for comment on Thursday.

Another friend of the Jenkins family, Barb Turner, was the mastermind behind the #TeamKiye signs sported by high schoolers last week. Turner said cancer diagnosis in young Libby boys has actually become a pattern in the town: her own son, Tytus Meister was diagnosed with Langerhans Cell Histiocytosis and Zachary Haines was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2012. Turner’s son is now in full remission and could be considered cured by 2018. After a two-year battle with cancer, Haines died in 2014 at 11 years old.

“Nobody knows what to do when your kid has cancer,” Turner said. “It’s a pattern of kids and parents alike that are standing back, looking at the rest of us like, wow, this is a lot.

“The point of support comes from Eryn being a great person,” she said. “Kiye is a great person, a great student and a great athlete. There are so many ideas being tossed around as far as fundraisers go. I think there’s a big push from Bigfork as well as here. We’re seeing little communities work together right now.”

Kiye wasn’t available for comment on Wednesday as nurses continued tests and preparation for chemotherapy.

“It’s amazing to see all his friends rally around him,” Eryn said. “It’s been a huge relief.”

Reporter Seaborn Larson may be reached at 758-4441 or by email at slarson@dailyinterlake.com.