A three-year-old battling leukemia had her spirits boosted when she was emotionally reunited with her twin sister after days apart during chemo.
Mom Brianna Black, 31, from Little River, South Carolina, said three-year-olds Maverick and Millie share an unbreakable bond with the pair having never been separated before Millie’s sudden diagnosis.
On January 22, the family was left in complete shock when Millie was diagnosed with High-Risk B-Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia (B-ALL).
The diagnosis resulted in an initial 14-day hospital admission to begin treatment, marking the first time the inseparable sisters had ever been apart.
Since then, Millie has endured multiple admissions at the MUSC Shawn Jenkins Children’s Hospital, keeping the girls separated for days at a time.
Because the family lives nearly three hours away, daily travel isn’t possible, so the sisters rely on FaceTime calls every day to stay connected.
However, when Millie is feeling up to it, Maverick makes the six-hour round trip for weekly clinic appointments, spending time in the car chatting and singing together.
Their bond was captured in a heartwarming video on July 2, when Maverick visited the hospital after the girls had been separated for four long days.
As Maverick came out the elevator, she ran to Millie for a reunion hug and danced up and down – before immediately going into “play mode” until their heads hit their pillow to go to sleep.
Millie is currently in active treatment, facing another six months of admissions and procedures, followed by 18 or more months of chemotherapy.
Brianna said: “Being together is the best form of medicine for Millie – she will have days that she is very down but the second her sister arrives, everything changes.
“It brought me to tears, I’m so grateful that they have each other.
“We’ve received so much love and support since I shared the video, I had no idea it would touch that many people.
“We get messages daily of people letting us know that they are praying for our family. We’ve even had people find our Amazon wishlist and send gifts to our house!”
Beyond the emotional support, the family hopes Millie’s journey will spark critical conversations about the realities of childhood cancer and the need to support research for new, improved, and less toxic treatments.
She added: “Pediatric cancer is one of the leading causes of death by disease in children, but it only receives less than 4% of the federal cancer research budget.”
