PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — Two years into his NFL career, Devon Still was sidelined by a devastating discovery: His 4-year-old daughter, Leah, was diagnosed with stage 4 neuroblastoma.
Her chances of survival were 50-50. But after several treatments, Leah beat those odds. She recently celebrated being eight years in remission.
“She’s doing really good,” Still told KYW Newsradio. “She’s just living a carefree life right now and just enjoying being a child.”
The former NFL player is continuing to use his platform to bring awareness to childhood cancer and the burden it puts on families. Families going through it have immediate needs — something Still said he realized firsthand — and financial aid can “lift the burden off of their shoulders so that they can focus on the children who are battling cancer.”
That’s why he started the Still Strong Foundation in 2015, which provides grants to families affected by childhood cancers.
The Still Strong Foundation is hosting its seventh annual For Our Children Gala on Thursday at the Moshulu at Penn’s Landing. The foundation benefits local families at CHOP, St. Christopher’s Hospital for Children and Alfred I. DuPont Hospital for Children — hospitals and communities that saved Leah’s life.
“It’s important to bring awareness so that people know the need and what people are going through,” said Still, a Wilmington native who played at Penn State before becoming a second-round pick of the Cincinnati Bengals in 2012.
“As parents, we all want to have a certain amount of control over our child’s life and be able to protect them from anything that’s meant to harm them. And when you hear those words, you realize that you can’t protect them from what they’re going to do. But the one thing you can do is just be by their side every step of the way to let them know that they don’t have to go through it alone.”
Still said Leah’s fight has taught him so much.
“The No. 1 thing is that you can make it through anything,” he said. “If you really think about it, she was up against death. I’ve been up against a lot of things in my life as far as injuries, growing up in poverty, but I’ve never had a face-to-face battle with death. The way that she was able to compose herself and hold on to her hope and still smile while inspiring other people when she was going through such a tough time in her life was truly inspiring.”
Thursday’s event takes place at 6 p.m. with a cocktail reception followed by dinner, casino games, an auction and entertainment. Find registration and more information at stillstrongfoundation.org.
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