When Maisie Webb was two, she complained on a walk that her foot didn’t work, and her family thought she had probably just grown tired and wanted to be carried. She had been having occasional headaches and vomiting, but they did not seem too serious. Then one evening when Maisie was dancing, her foot slipped inward and she grabbed her head and screamed in pain. Her grandmother said “I will never forget that gut wrenching feeling that something was wrong, really wrong.” At the emergency room, tests were carried out on little Maisie. Her family grew uneasy, noticing the hush in the room and the sad expressions on the nurses’ faces. Finally, a doctor told the family that Maisie had a brain tumor. Maisie was put into a helicopter and flown to a children’s hospital.
 
Maisie’s tumor, supratentorial anaplastic ependymoma, was treated with four rounds of chemotherapy, two surgeries and proton radiation. She had her last dose of chemotherapy on her fourth birthday.
 
Despite the difficulty of going through treatment, Maisie and her mother, grandmother, and brother spent their weekends visiting beaches and sightseeing near the hospital in Jacksonville, Florida, where they had traveled for her proton radiation. Maisie made her family take her to the zoo or playrooms, and made them laugh even on days they wanted to cry.
 
Today, Maisie’s cancer is in remission and she a very loving little girl who enjoys dressing up, acting, Barbie dolls, and playing with her puppy. Because of Maisie’s experiences, her family has started a nonprofit, projectmaisiehugs.com, which gives dolls to children with cancer and other diseases to help them cope with being separated from family members while in the hospital.

Update, Summer 2015: 
Maisie just completed the 2nd grade with flying colors. She is reading at at 4th grade level and was the best reader in her entire grade of 100+ kids. She is an extremely smart little girl. Maisie also enjoys art. She is quite the artist and our home is covered in her drawings and paintings. She even took a door and named it Maisie's art museum and hung all of her creations on it. 

Maisie is an independent, loving, caring, and thoughtful person. She is strong willed and so hard headed and determined. I do not think she's ever failed at anything she's made up her mind to do. Maisie really enjoys playing outside with all of the kids from the neighborhood. She loves hosting sleepovers for her friends too. 

Everything I begged God to let her experience she has been able to. I used to hold her in her sleep as the chemo ran in her tiny little two year old body pleading with God to just let her go to school one day, just let her run outside with friends, just let her have slumber parties, just let her be a little kid, just let her live and praise God and St. Jude's she has.

Update, June 2024:
Maisie is still 100% cancer free! She will be graduating high school in early December. She plans to attend nursing school while working in a pediatric facility and helping kids like her doctors helped her. She is set on becoming a forensic nurse in California where she can keep giving care to those in need.

"Driving, homecoming, proms, graduation, college are all things I hoped for her," her mom, Laniesa, said. "To see her on the brink of adulthood and setting out on her own journey is so bittersweet...She is such a wonderful young lady with a lot of life to live." 

Information provided by the Webb Family