High School Students Pay Tribute To Inspirational Classmate Battling Cancer
NEWTOWN SQUARE, Pa., (CBS) -- It was a fitting standing ovation with many wearing Shelly Strong t-shirts.
Before Friday night's basketball game, Marple Newtown freshman Michael Shelly celebrated a huge milestone.
For the first time since he was diagnosed this summer, after having stomach pains during football practice, scans and biopsy's show Michael has no signs of cancer and has just three more rounds of chemotherapy left.
The past few months Michael has been spending more time in the hospital than school.
"We were completely shocked when they tell you your 14-year-old son has cancer," Melissa Shelly, Michael's mother, said.
In the beginning of the school year Michael had the honor of leading his fellow football teammates out onto the field.
His battle was just beginning then.
He was facing 10 grueling rounds of chemotherapy and all the side effects as he battled Burkitt's non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, a rare and aggressive form of cancer.
"That was awful," described Michael as he described the medication he had to take and the physical limitations he experienced early on.
But even through it all the 15-year-old maintained his sense of humor, even serenading a nurse with a ukulele.
It's that sort of personality that has helped drive friends at school and beyond to cheer him on.
You could see across the court that the players on the opposing team, Springfield, also gave him a standing ovation.
"You don't choose to have cancer," Melissa Shelly said. "You choose how to deal with it."
Through it all, he learned to appreciate nights like this where he just gets to hang out and be a kid.
"The littlest things now mean so much more," Michael said.
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