Tuesday, October 6, 2009

A Beautiful Child/ an Epic Battle


Image © Robert Harris Photography-
When you first meet Ber van der Meer, "Bear", you see a witty young five year old boy with a lively sense of humor and a heartwarming smile. Underlying however is a young boy battling stage IV Neuroblastoma ( a rare form of cancer that is diagnosed in only 600 children each year) Since 2007 when Ber was diagnosed, he has undergone several rounds of treatments and operations in New York where he will be visiting again at the end of this month for further treatment.
We had the pleasure of photographing Ber and his family on a beautiful morning before his next round of treatment and tests begin. A special thanks to our daughter, Katie who helped with the session and Kara, (our volunteer associate for the day) for helping as well. I especially enjoyed Ber's "high five" and his sister, Lizzie's hug (with a pat on the back) at the end our time together.
Let us all enjoy each day we are given with our families as the van der Meer family demonstrates so well.

To learn more about Neuroblastoma or to wish Ber well, you may visit his mother's blog:
www.caringbridge.org/visit/ber

To support NB research: www.bandofparents.org

5 comments:

Aaron @ www.HornIT.net said...

I just wanted to thank you for what you did for the Van Der Meers. My son (Eli) is also a Neuroblastoma patient being treated at MSKCC and a very good friend of Ber's. Having these moments captured mean A LOT to our families, probably more so than your normal clients. I just wanted to say thank you for supporting our friends.

Aaron Horn
Ames, IA
www.elihorn.com

Anonymous said...

The pictures are gorgeos. It is a wonderful thing for the peole who did this for you. It is to bad more people did things like this for people. God Bless.

Anonymous said...

Gorgeous photos and truly a wonderful gift for an awesome family battling so courageously. Thanks for doing this for our friends! We appreciate your generosity!

Robert Harris Photography said...

Thank you for all of your posts. It has been our pleasure to provide these portraits to Ber and his family.

Anonymous said...

Those are such precious pictures. May God bless you and your family for doing such a wonderful thing.

Thank you from the bottom of our hearts.....