Kindergartner to Disease: ‘So Long, Cancer’ – Take a Bite Out of This

WEST DES MOINES, IA -- Doctors say West Des Moines kindergarten student Clark Schebel will live to see another birthday. But he doesn’t want a party, at least not for that milestone.

Instead, the 6-year-old Jordan Creek Elementary School student wants a cake and a celebration to mark the end of a not-so-happy time – a diagnosis of kidney cancer, then months of biopsies, surgery and chemotherapy. He’s cancer-free now and he wants to kick the disease out of his life for good.

“So long, cancer!” his cake will proclaim at a big party Friday at the school.

And good riddance, friends, relatives and an extended school family that enveloped Rob and Heather Schebel and their two sons in kindness and generosity would agree.

Healthy Until Suddenly He Wasn't

The Schebels' ordeal started last August. One day, Clark was fine. The next, he had blood in his urine and was sounding an alarm that is almost humorous now that Clark is cancer-free.

“Mom, I told you there was such a thing as diarrhea pee,” Clark recalled telling his mother, who blushed a little when her son shared his understanding of what was going on with his body.

But at the time, they were some of the most frightening words a parent can hear.

A biopsy confirmed that Clark had Wilms’ tumor, a rare form of cancer affecting primarily children. Two days later, on Aug. 29, he was in surgery and the affected kidney was removed.

The Schebels said that during the ensuing months, they were the recipients of an outpouring of support that amazed them.

Gifts of food, blankets and hats to swaddle Clark’s head when chemo robbed him of his hair showed up on their doorstep. Clark has 11 of them in all, and they’re strung in a row, a fitting metaphor for the warmth and comfort extended the family. In another case, someone left a jar containing $40 and a note signed only with a question mark.

At school, Clark’s classmates left notes in his backpack that offered encouragement and plastered the school walls with posters of support. Through the Children’s Cancer Connection, he received a child-sized stuffed monkey that sat in his chair when he had to miss school for treatment.

The monkey has only one day of school left, when Clark will have some routine tests.

Just as the monkey “graduated,” so has Clark. He’s cancer free.

The family was honored at the school last week at a Character Assembly for being a “super hero family.” 

“Everyone is in the same boat, but there are parents in worse situations.” – Rob Schebel

One of the things they recognized during Clark’s treatment was that not everyone is as fortunate as their family was. They wanted to help the people they’d grown close to during Clark’s treatment whose journeys were more difficult and had less favorable outcomes.

They established a pledge drive, selling “The Little Superman” – Clark is named after the alter ego of Rob’s favorite superhero, Superman – bracelets and raising $4,000 for St. Jude’s Children’s Research Hospital. Heather, a distance runner, will run in a half marathon in Memphis to help raise money for the children’s hospital.

She also donated some of her marathon medals to the Medals4Mettle program, through which athletes donate medals to be given to cancer survivors in recognition of the mettle they showed in fighting the disease.

“Everyone is in the same boat,” Rob said, “but there are parents in worse situations.”

Clark’s prognosis is excellent, his parents said. He was diagnosed at Stage 2, which has a 98 percent survival rate, Clark said.

“When your kids are healthy,” Heather said, “you are lucky.”

Going to "Blah, Blah Land"

For Clark, battling the disease was an exercise in both bravery and creativity.

Rob, an English teacher at Valley High School, marveled at his and Heather’s son’s ingenuity. He created a place in his head called “Blah, Blah Land,” and he would go there when the chemotherapy needle was inserted in the port in his tiny little boy’s chest.

Clark’s eyes grew wide as he described it – a place of dark chocolate rivers, strawberry mountains and castles made of Hershey’s chocolate bars.

“I hate to tell you,” Clark’s older brother, Gabe, 10, interjected. “But the strawberry mountains are gone.”

“No.” Clark responded, shaking his head. “Everybody has their own.”

That’s one of the things he would tell other kids fighting cancer, to rely on their imaginations to create a soft landing place.

“He did that the first time we were there,” Rob said, beaming proudly. “That was his coping strategy, and he came up with that on his own.”

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