The 2024 Long Beach Athletic Department’s “Beauty and the Beast” Gymnastics and Wrestling Invitational is in honor of Lia Esposito. The Invitational will be held on Thursday, January 25th 2024 at 7pm at Long Beach High School. Below you can read about the journey of Lia. We want to thank Oceanside. Hewlett and Bethpage Varsity Gymnatics Teams as well as Hewlett Varsity Wrestling team in joining us tonight to raise money for Pediatric Cancer Research at Memorial Sloane Kettering Kids Program. Gold is the color that symbolizes the fight against pediatric cancer. On the night of the event our athletes will wear gold to honor not only Lia but also the other kids and families who are in the fight against this cancer.
Meet Lia Esposito
This year all proceeds from the Beauty and the Beast Invitational will be donated to MSK kids in the name of Lia Esposito, this is her story. On June 11th 2023, Lia was complaining of stomach pain and wouldn’t eat. Lia was immediately taken to the hospital for tests and imaging. At Cohens children’s hospital, her familly recived news from doctors that no one would ever imagine hearing – “Your daughter has a large tumor on her left kidney. They needed to surgically remove her kidney and the tumor. Lia needed to start chemotherapy immediately. This healthy young girl who never had any health problems now suddenly diagnosed with cancer. It was unbearable to hear. She had to have surgery to remove her kidney because the tumor was too big and growing too fast. The surgery was dificult and she spent 9 days in the hospital after surgery for recovery. After the recovery Lia, began her journey of 25 weeks of chemotherapy. Lia has now completed her 25 weeks of chemo and her end of treatment scans were all clear. She had her chemo port surgically removed and she’s officially done with treatment. Lia has been amazing throughout this whole process. She’s always full of energy, always dancing and doing cartwheels, and just overall happy! We’re praying that by the end of December she will be done with chemo and everything will be clear on all her scans. Lia continues to have play dates, goes to school, and does cheerleading and dance! Nothing is going to stop Lia, she is truly an inspiration to all of us! Thank you so much for reading Lia’s story!
To learn more and donate please visit: https://secure2.convio.net/mskcc/site/TR?team_id=87921&fr_id=4032&pg=team
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