Young Hockey Player Takes On Cancer Fight Like Athlete
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- For Mitch Novak, life centers on baseball and hockey. Watching him now, you'd never know that the 15-year-old is fighting cancer.
"I just like playing with my teammates and having the experience," Novak said. "I was at hockey one day when it was summertime and I couldn't do the drills that other kids were doing."
Two years ago at a hockey camp, Novak was having trouble keeping up.
"I just had trouble breathing when I was running, so my mom took me in," he said.
What they thought would be a quick checkup turned out to be a devastating diagnosis.
"My whole world came to an end, right there," mother Kelli Novak said. "I thought, 'I am in a nightmare.'"
At 13 years old, Mitch Novak had Hodgkin's Lymphoma. The athlete in him kicked in, tackling the fight head-on with chemotherapy.
"After his first four rounds we had to do it again," Kelli Novak said.
Mitch Novak suffered relapses and went through 28 rounds of radiation.
"When Make-A-Wish came in I just thought, 'Oh my gosh, this is going to make him so healthy,'" Kelli Novak said. "It's going to help him get through this."
Mitch Novak's wish took him as far from the hospital room as you can go, the Bahamas.
"He really wanted to swim with those dolphins," his mother said. "He just thought that was unreal. He was like, 'Can I really do that?' It was just so amazing seeing him happy because he was so sick for so long. ... He was so unhappy that he never thought he was going to do this. So to see him happy it made me happy."
"It was amazing," Mitch Novak said. "Just swimming with the dolphins and being [there]."
It was a trip not only filled with incredible memories, but maybe a little extra healing power, too.
"I think it helps them fight even harder," Kelli Novak said. "To get better and know that there is a happy place. That it's not all sad, there's people out there that want to help you. Make-A-Wish is the best."
To donate airline miles and help grant other wishes, click here.
