{"id":293808,"date":"2026-04-30T21:30:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T21:30:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/293808\/"},"modified":"2026-04-30T21:30:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T21:30:08","slug":"boy-diagnosed-with-rare-form-of-leukemia-meets-youtuber-mark-rober-at-disneyland-through-make-a-wish-foundation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/293808\/","title":{"rendered":"Boy diagnosed with rare form of leukemia meets YouTuber Mark Rober at Disneyland through Make-A-Wish Foundation"},"content":{"rendered":"

A dream came true for a boy that’s gone through so much over the past year.<\/p>\n

Brendan and Alexandra are living the dream, but it almost took a tragic turn after Brendan finished the 4th grade when his parents realized something was wrong.<\/p>\n

“We just noticed he was getting unexplained fevers, here and there,” said Brendan’s father said, Deric Ma. “We took him to, like, many doctors.”<\/p>\n

It was a rare form of leukemia, and very aggressive. Things began to go downhill quickly.<\/p>\n

“We’re both shocked and scared, as you know, as you know, as you can think of for anyone who’s in this situation, but we did our prayers,” Ma said.<\/p>\n

Eventually, those prayers were answered when doctors found a bone marrow donor, no other than Brendan’s mom. She also reached out to Disney and the Make-A-Wish Foundation<\/a>, hoping her son would survive to see his YouTube hero Mark Rober. She said Rober’s science videos became inspirational during long, uncomfortable hospital stays.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

“My friend told me about him, and I should start, like, checking him out,” Brendan said. “Then I got hooked.”<\/p>\n

“And it, you know, was really important, especially all through last year when he had ups and downs,” said Brendan’s mom, Jacqueline Tse. “To keep your eye on the prize, Brendan, you have to get better.”<\/p>\n

“Once Make-A-Wish sent me the reveal content, that’s when I sent it,” Tse said. “I had Brendan and Alexandra watch the reveal and I think they were in disbelief.”<\/p>\n

Brendan, along with his family, went to Disneyland where his wish to meet Rober came true.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Brendan loves swimming, pickle ball, and video games and is thriving once again.<\/p>\n

“My parents helped me the most by supporting me,” Brendan said. “I’m glad that I could talk to my friends again and have, like, go to the movies at them.”<\/p>\n

“Every single day we are grateful,” Tse said. “We don’t take a day for granted anymore. Our perspective on life, on the future–everything changed.”<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

A Disney wish is granted every hour of every day.<\/p>\n

Throughout Disney’s Week of Wishes, the entire company will join Make-A-Wish to grant life-changing wishes for kids fighting critical illnesses in ways that only Disney can.<\/p>\n

Since the first official wish was granted at Disneyland 45 years ago, Disney has worked with Make-A-Wish to grant more than 170,000 life-changing wishes around the world.<\/p>\n

Copyright \u00a9 2026 WABC-TV. All Rights Reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A dream came true for a boy that’s gone through so much over the past year. Brendan and…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":293809,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[36],"tags":[125053,163,165,164],"class_list":["post-293808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-anaheim","tag-125053","tag-anaheim","tag-anaheim-headlines","tag-anaheim-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293808","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=293808"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293808\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/293809"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=293808"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=293808"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=293808"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}