The tackle itself wasn’t exactly pleasant.
What it ultimately uncovered was terrifying, but it also was an opportunity to show the Riverside-Brookfield High School community what Mateo Sikora was made of.
Last September, at a Wednesday football practice, Sikora was playing linebacker, defending against a running play. No big deal. He’d been there plenty of times that fall.
“The running back was coming at me,” the rising sophomore recalled. “I came and I tackled him, and once I brought him down, his cleat hit my lower abdomen, and I had pain for a couple of days.”
That might not be a surprise, but that Friday, when he went to urgent care to get it checked out, something was wrong.
Very wrong.
“We went to urgent care, and they’re like, ‘No, this is serious, you have to go the hospital,’ so then we went to Hinsdale, and they were like, ‘You have to go to an emergency hospital,’” he said. “So, they took me in an ambulance to Loyola (in Maywood) that night, all on Friday.”
Two days later, after close observation and a biopsy, Loyola doctors delivered the bad news – a 10-centimeter tumor on Sikora’s pelvic bone. A cancer known as Ewing’s sarcoma.
Thomas Paine is famous for his quote, “These are the times that try men’s souls.” But Sikora was just a freshman. What would he know of such matters?
Not much, of course, but in addition to the support and prayers of his family, friends and coaches, he had an attitude of victory.
“Really for me, I just thought the best way that would help me was always staying positive and always praying and believing I would beat it,” he said. “I never really thought I wasn’t going to beat it.”
And beat it, he did. Last Friday, he rang the bell at Lurie Children’s Hospital downtown that indicated he had beaten his cancer. He rang it strong and proud, with a smile that indicated the posture he carried throughout his academically abbreviated freshman year, when surgery and intravenous and radiation therapy, sometimes for days on end, sank him to low points.
How did it feel to ring that bell?
“It was the feeling of relief, just finally after 10 months, this long journey has come to an end,” Sikora said Sunday sitting in his family’s home in Riverside. “I did ring it pretty hard a couple times and then everyone was cheering for me.”
To say Sikora had plenty of cheerleaders in his corner might be an understatement. In addition to his folks, Anna and Joe, and older brother, Sam, a recent Fenwick graduate, there was oncologist Dr. Elizabeth Sokol, whose practice specializes in sarcomas.
“We made it to the finish line,” Anna Sikora said of her reaction to the bell ringing. “This was the goal. We did all the things. We followed all the protocols and recommendations. We followed the recipe and it worked.”
Then there was RB head football coach Sam Styler, who said the incident was “heartbreaking,” but displayed Sikora’s mettle.
“He had a battle in front of him, but the way he approached it, he knew it was a long journey ahead, (and) he took it in stride,” Styler said. “Throughout the entire process, it showed how wonderful a kid he was.”
Football season is coming up, and Styler said Sikora is going to help out with his team any way he can as a manager.
“He will be one of my right-hand men,” he said. “We’re extremely lucky to have him.”
Then there is Bulldogs’ varsity boys basketball coach Mike Reingruber, who has known Sikora since he played in the Junior Bulldogs program.
That, Reingruber said, is exactly what Sikora is – a bulldog.
“If anyone was going to face this thing head on and destroy it, it’s him,” he said. “Obviously, you’re in a spot, no one knows where it’s going to go, you’re praying everything will go well, but on the same token, he’s as tough as they come and with the greatest, most positive attitude.”
If there was anything kind of cool about the experience, it was the presence of t-shirts in the community emblazoned with Sikora Strong on the front. In fact, Reingruber said the entire boys basketball program wore them often as warmup shirts last season.
Sikora, who will have to get scans every three months going forward, is fully aware that there are other kids out there, and adults, who may wind up facing their own health issues. He’s got counsel for them.
“Always set yourself a goal and always have something to look forward to,” he said. “That’s what helped me the most, I think. If I knew I would be in the hospital for a week, I would just think about at the end of the week, what’s a good meal, or a good sports game I’m looking forward to watching?
“I just had faith it was going to work out.”