Four years ago, Grant Hagemeister was sleeping on a pull-out couch at a hospital where his 14-year-old son Jack was being treated for acute lymphocytic leukemia, a possible life-threatening cancer of the blood and bone marrow.
Fast forward to last Friday when Jack received his diploma after graduating from Redondo Union High School and waved it happily to his parents, Grant and Cara Hagemeister, and his younger brother, Charlie.
It was a special Father’s Day gift for Grant Hagemeister, a telecommunications consultant, who said later, “Jack’s graduation was a combination of joy, relief and excitement. Father’s Day will be extra special this year. I am blessed to have two healthy and happy sons who have grown from boys into men.”
Jack has since recovered from often intense treatment, which included regular intravenous chemotherapy and spinal taps at Miller Children’s Hospital in Long Beach. At the time, Jack said he battled through months of what he called “agonizing treatment, the hardest in my life.”
Last week Jack told me that his father’s devotion and love through his leukemia ordeal “made the experience infinitely more bearable. My dad sacrificed countless hours of his time to ensure that my treatment was the best it could be. My dad has always been that way.” Jack said there were some children at the hospital going through their treatment alone.
Jack’s mother, a school teacher, said Jack finished his treatment in September 2021 and goes back every month or so for checkups. “He’s extremely blessed to be healthy and like his old, normal self,” she said.
Jack was diagnosed when he was in the eighth grade at Adams Middle School in Redondo Beach. To give him support, the more than 1,000 students at the school, as well as teachers and administrators, went outside on the soccer field and spelled out with their bodies, “We got your back, Jack!”
Jack’s father said the best part of the last couple of years and what may be inspiring to other families that have children with cancer is how things have worked out for the Hagemeisters.
“We did not know what to expect at the initial diagnosis and through two plus years of rather intense treatments,” he said. “What is our child going to be like physically and mentally after this ordeal and all of this chemo throughout his whole system? For him to thrive academically in what we consider a great high school while still in treatment and then after treatments was awesome.”
He said his son was able to go to his high school football games, homecoming dances and proms and have a great high school experience. He also earned the distinction of being a National Merit Scholar.
“For him to be back to his happy, healthy self is the best part,” his father said. “Tough times don’t last, tough people do.”
Grant Hagemeister praised his son for setting up a GoFundMe page to help families of children with cancer.
Jack said he had noticed that while he was being treated in the hospital he saw other children who were alone while they were undergoing chemotherapy infusions. He said he learned from nurses that many families had to work to pay for the basic necessities for their recovering children and weren’t able to spend a lot of time visiting them.
“Not everyone was blessed like me,” he said at the time. To support other cancer patients and their families he set up the GoFundMe page with proceeds going to the nonprofit Parents Against Cancer which is affiliated with the Jonathan Jaques Children’s Cancer Institute at Miller Children’s. The organization helps cover the cost of food, medical supplies, transportation, utilities and other things necessary to make families feel more secure during treatment.
Jack’s father said the page, started when his son was having treatment, continues today and has raised more than $49,400.
He said other heroes in fighting cancer are the doctors and nurses who help children having treatment. “It is incredible how they balance the emotional and medical aspects of the young patients and their families,” he said.
Another achievement by his son, he said, was his acceptance to USC on a full scholarship studying for a chemical engineering degree to pursue a career in improving the environment. Grant Hagemeister said that, for him, his son’s attendance at USC “will be a dream come true for me because USC is where I went many years ago. ‘Fight On,’ (USC’s fight song) now has a double meaning for our family.”
There has always been fight and resilience in his son’s makeup.
Jack’s first words to his parents when he was diagnosed with leukemia four years ago was, “I’ve got this. When can I start fighting?”
Jack said he felt invigorated after his battle with cancer, “both to find joy and meaning in my life and to give back to those that helped me along the way. I want to prove to them and to the world that there was and is a reason that I survived.”
He said he didn’t know exactly what the future holds, but he said he wanted to approach it with optimism and the many things he learned from his father.
In a personal note to his father, Jack said, “Dad, thanks for always being there and teaching us how to do what is right. I love you. Happy Father’s Day.”