An eager 11-year-old boy whose cancer is in remission walked up the steps to a newly built treehouse behind his Alexander home for the first time Monday, helping friends climb up right behind him.
The day marked the completion of a wish made by Caleb Waddle, granted months after volunteers initially approached him and his family during the height of his cancer treatment.
Lorey Phillips, a volunteer with the Make-A-Wish Foundation, said the project was one that required input from Caleb, who worked with a Fayetteville architect and sought input from the TV series Ultimate Treehouses to make his vision a reality.
The wish, she said, was particularly special in that Caleb was thinking about how his wish could also effect others.
"He wanted something that he could share with all of his friends. It was not just him that he wanted to reward," she said. "He wanted his friends to be with him and to have fun and play every day."
A party thrown Monday at the Waddle family home signaled the final stage of the project, but that was not the end of Caleb's Make-A-Wish story.
Under a table were several gifts for Caleb's new treehouse, known as his "man cave." Among the gifts: a microwave, a heater and a mini refrigerator.
For Caleb, a pediatrician visit in September 2014 for a football-related injury proved lifesaving. After an initial consultation, he was transported to Arkansas Children's Hospital for further evaluation.
Doctors at the hospital performed a scan and found a large tumor that had metastasized into his lungs and multiple other tumors in his lungs. The diagnosis: a treatable but serious form of Hodgkin's lymphoma.
"It was overwhelming," Carol Waddle said of the moment she learned of her son's cancer diagnosis. "You just can't digest that because he's a healthy kid up to that point. No clue that anything like that could happen."
Within about a month, Carol Waddle said, her son was undergoing chemotherapy.
Radiation began last January, and throughout the treatments, friends, family and teachers stayed close by, routinely visiting while Caleb was at home.
"We would take him to school every now and then, just so he could stay in the social aspect of it," she said.
In the spring of last year, Caleb was able to return to school as doctors monitored signs of progress in his treatment.
"He has gone through a couple of scans so far, and they all been clear. He's doing really good," Carol Waddle said, adding that Caleb has another checkup scheduled for March. After that visit, he is set to go in annually for follow-up visits.
