Casey Baer and Molly Greenstone
Casey Baer and Molly Greenstone, two of Sydney's 7th-grade friends from Heritage Middle School, also brainstormed a fundraiser to benefit Make Some Noise, a pediatric cancer research foundation. On Sunday, more than 1,000 people turned out for an event called Strike Out Pediatric Cancer, which raised about $30,000 for cancer research, said Mitch Katz, a family friend and one of the event's organizers.
"There has been so much support," Sydney said this week. "It's sad that it takes something so terrible to make people come together, but I am trying to stay positive."
Sydney said her friends wanted to help her recovery efforts but couldn't drive carpools or cook dinner. They came up with they idea to do a fundraising run/walk, and that evolved into the softball-themed event to honor Sydney.
Raising the money for Make Some Noise was a no-brainer, Sydney said, because the organization has been so helpful to her in the past few months by putting her in touch with other pediatric cancer patients.
"Talking to other people my age is helpful, and especially people who have been through it," she said. "Adults try to be reassuring, but they don't know what it's like, and these kids do because they did the same thing."
Today, Sydney will have surgery at Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York to replace her tumor-infected bone with titanium. That, combined with another five months of chemotherapy, should keep the cancer from coming back, her father said.
Casey Baer and Molly Greenstone, two of Sydney's 7th-grade friends from Heritage Middle School, also brainstormed a fundraiser to benefit Make Some Noise, a pediatric cancer research foundation. On Sunday, more than 1,000 people turned out for an event called Strike Out Pediatric Cancer, which raised about $30,000 for cancer research, said Mitch Katz, a family friend and one of the event's organizers.
"There has been so much support," Sydney said this week. "It's sad that it takes something so terrible to make people come together, but I am trying to stay positive."
Sydney said her friends wanted to help her recovery efforts but couldn't drive carpools or cook dinner. They came up with they idea to do a fundraising run/walk, and that evolved into the softball-themed event to honor Sydney.
Raising the money for Make Some Noise was a no-brainer, Sydney said, because the organization has been so helpful to her in the past few months by putting her in touch with other pediatric cancer patients.
"Talking to other people my age is helpful, and especially people who have been through it," she said. "Adults try to be reassuring, but they don't know what it's like, and these kids do because they did the same thing."
Today, Sydney will have surgery at Memorial Sloan Kettering in New York to replace her tumor-infected bone with titanium. That, combined with another five months of chemotherapy, should keep the cancer from coming back, her father said.