Meet the Gray Family

At the gala each year, we have the great honor of sharing one of our wonderful Lending Hearts families. This year, we are pleased to present the Gray family. We are thankful to the Gray family for opening their hearts and sharing such a personal part of their lives.

Please take a moment to read their family's journey as shared by Bryson's mom, Breanne...

Our son, Bryson was diagnosed with Leukemia at 3 years old in June 2022.  The treatment for his type of Leukemia is 3.5 years long. We will be ringing the bell this year in October! He will be almost 7 then.   When you are first hit with the news “your child has cancer” the world pauses. Feelings of worry, grief, fear and overwhelming helplessness crowd out hope and positivity. There is also an indescribable stress that takes over. How can we do this? How can we make this work? What is going to happen? What about our other children? How do we keep our family together? How do we keep our child safe from germs? Will we be able to see our friends? It would be so easy to just let these feelings take over but I decided to choose to always find something positive each day of our journey. Without a support system it is difficult to remain hopeful. How do you manage jobs, other children, your home, financial burdens…all while living in the hospital or traveling daily for long appointments? You must lean on people to help you, to offer encouraging words, to jump in and offer help anyway they can. And perhaps one of the most difficult tasks is, let others help you. Say yes to help. This is the only way our family survived.  During our initial diagnosis and treatment we stayed for 30 days at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh. One of the first days we were there, it was a Friday, lunches were delivered to our room from someone from “Lending Hearts”. We began to learn more about this amazing organization. We signed up for Vasso’s emails and never looked back! We found hope, fun and people who understood. No one understands more than others who have, or are going through a similar situation.  We’ve made lifelong friends and are very grateful to Vasso and Lending Hearts for reminding us that others can lift you up and soften the fall. They can also bring joy and help celebrate the hope- this is exactly what Lending Hearts does for children and their entire families. Lending Hearts is synonymous with Grace, Kindness, Acceptance, Togetherness, Support, Love and Fun.  We feel very blessed to be here tonight to help showcase what this organization means to families like ours.