by Ronda Lickteig
R-T Editor
It’s really not surprising that Mackenzie Cunningham’s favorite ride at Disney World was the roller coaster – it’s kind of an analogy for how her life has been since being diagnosed with cancer.
Photo Courtesy of Cunningham Family
Mackenzie Cunningham had the trip of a lifetime when she and her parents, Kylie and Eric, were treated to a trip to Disney World by the Dream Factory.
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Mackenzie, the five-year-old daughter of Kylie and Eric Cunningham of rural Trenton, was diagnosed with acute lymphoblastic leukemia in December 2018. The diagnosis came quickly after blood tests were conducted to see what was causing a low-grade fever she’d had for about a week.
“They did the bloodwork and it came back totally abnormal,” Kylie recalls. “We went to Children’s Mercy that night. The diagnosis was traumatizing. It was definitely shocking. You know, no one thinks it will ever happen to them.”
Mackenzie had just turned three and would begin what would ultimately be 2 1/2 years of chemotherapy – definitely not the childhood anyone would hope for their little girl.
Enter the Dream Factory, an organization that is dedicated to making the dreams of critically and chronically ill children come true. Someone who knew what Mackenzie had been going through contacted local Dream Factory volunteer Ron Dougan, who got the ball rolling to help Mackenzie realize a dream of going to Disney World – and more importantly, having a time away from all things “cancer.”
The organization paid all expenses for the family to travel to Orlando, FL, where they stayed at Give Kids the World. The 89-acre, nonprofit resort in Kissimmee, FL provides week-long, cost-free wish vacations to critically ill children and their families from around the world who visit Central Florida.
“Give Kids the World was really the best thing about the trip,” said Kylie, noting that the trip occurred in Jan. 2020 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Even with meet-and-greets with princesses, Micky and Minnie, her beloved “Toy Story” friends and all the characters that make Disney Disney, it was the roller coasters that captured Mackenzie’s attention.
“She wanted to go on them all the time,” Eric said. “She even wanted to go on the one that went upside down, but she wasn’t tall enough. She rode one about 10 times because we got to do all the rides without standing in line.”
Life is back to “normal” now – at least as normal as it will be for awhile. Mackenzie is in remission but may have suffered organ and spleen damage. Her blood count has not come back up to normal, so while she will be a kindergarten student this fall, the family has opted to home school for now to keep her as safe as possible. Her energy level has returned to that of a typical five-year-old and the future looks promising. When the family looks back on these years somewhere down the road, they will remember how scared they were for their daughter and how difficult it was to watch her go through cancer treatments. But they will also remember how the Dream Factory gave them a priceless gift when they needed it most.
“It was a stress-free week for us,” said Kylie. “We got to forget about cancer.”