Nicole 's Valerie Fund Story
A Valerie Fund Patient
Current Age: 28
Diagnosis: AMPL Leukemia
Being diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia just days before my fifteenth birthday was undeniably life-altering. One moment, I was spending my summer as a teenager enjoying beach life at the Jersey Shore—soaking up sunshine and newfound independence. The next, I was told the random bruises on my body were caused by leukemia, and I became a cancer patient overnight, suddenly faced with blood and platelet transfusions, spinal taps, bone marrow biopsies, chemotherapy, and hair loss.
From those very first days and through the many years that followed, I always felt supported, seen, and understood by everyone at The Valerie Fund Center in Morristown. After an initial month-long hospital stay, I began outpatient chemotherapy five days a week, where I quickly bonded with the nursing staff. Their warmth, humor, and compassion brought lightness to long, often difficult treatment days. It meant so much to be treated not just as a patient but as a normal teenager. They joked with me, encouraged me, and truly cared about me and my entire family. Even on the hardest days for me and other patients, the clinic felt alive with joy, connection, and hope.
I completed treatment on January 29, 2014, after three challenging years of chemo, arsenic trioxide, countless pills, and regular bone marrow biopsies. I remained in long-term follow-up care for a decade, always looking forward to my check-ins and catching up with my care team. Last summer, I officially “graduated” from these visits. There are simply too many survivors to continue long-term follow-ups after ten years—which feels like the best kind of “problem” to have.
Though my time as a patient has ended, my relationship with The Valerie Fund family is lifelong. When I published my book, Courageous Well-Being for Nurses, in 2023, several Valerie Fund staff members—including Maureen Baker ANP, Shannon Holland APN, Tricia Patterson RN, Gina Fleming RN, and Cathy Cerruti LCSW—joined me to celebrate at a book launch event. It was a full-circle moment and a chance to honor the nurses who helped me heal by offering something back to their profession.
I truly credit my survival to an incredible team of caregivers: Dr. Neier, Dr. Halpern, Dr. Fritz, and Dr. Gregory, along with Maureen Baker ANP, Shannon Holland APN, Anne Marie O’Keefe APN, Tricia Patterson RN, Gina Fleming RN, Cathy Cerruti LCSW, and the many other nurses, child life specialists, and support staff who walked beside me through it all.
As The Valerie Fund celebrates 50 years of providing compassionate, comprehensive care, I feel immense gratitude for the role they’ve played in my life and the lives of so many others. Their work is nothing short of life-changing.