NASHVILLE, Tenn. (WTVF) — When people are faced with the most difficult challenges of their lives, it often helps to hear from someone who's lived it too and who cares enough to reach out.
McKenzie Baxter very much understands, that sometimes something beautiful can be followed by something very difficult.
About nine months after having her first child, James Rhett, McKenzie felt something was very wrong.
"I got to the point I couldn't breathe," she remembered. "I was bruising everywhere. I was always fatigued."
McKenzie ended up at the Sarah Cannon Cancer Institute at TriStar Centennial.
"Acute myeloid leukemia," she said. "It was hard. It felt like so much of being a mom was being taken away from me. He's the reason I keep fighting. I had a bone marrow, stem cell transplant back in April. I should know results in the next couple days if I'm still in remission or not."
Also at Sarah Cannon is Sara Walton.
"She looks like her name," she said, sitting on a hospital bed with newborn daughter Elleott. "We changed the spelling on it too to make it a little more girly. It's Elleott. We girlied her up a little bit."
It was only hours before her delivery that Sara felt an overwhelming pain in her leg.
"They took my vitals and my heart rate was 206," Sara said. "This was way off. This was way off. I had no idea. I did have leukemia. I've been here a month. I've taken one round of chemo."
McKenzie figured Sara needed a friend.
"We've been watching Dr. Phil," smiled Sara, sitting with McKenzie in the hospital room.
"Oh yeah. You gotta watch Steve Harvey and Family Feud," McKenzie laughed.
McKenzie saw a Facebook post about Sara and reached out. McKenzie feels a new purpose for herself, reaching out through social media to just be there and support other new mothers living with cancer.
"Girl, I can't run to save my life," McKenzie said as both women laughed. "They need to hold out a chicken strip for me to come runnin'!"
The conversation later becomes more serious.
"While I was gone, I felt like someone else was raising Rhett," McKenzie said. "That tore me up inside. Being a mom was my life's dream. You gotta keep in mind, you can't take care of [Elleott] if you're not well. That's been the best thing through all of this is you get that time. It's hard. It really is."
"There's lots of good people in the world who are willing to help," Sara said of McKenzie.
"This is what God wants," McKenzie continued. "I'm always willing to talk to anybody about anything."
Do you have a positive, good news story? You can email me at forrest.sanders@newschannel5.com
I grew up in a small town with a small-town newspaper. Those reporters know the town perhaps better than anyone – the town officials, the high school superstars, the troublemakers, the difference makers. Forrest Sanders brings us a beautiful story about life and death and the enduring legacy of a small-town reporter and his written words.
-Carrie Sharp
