The Kessel Family

In early March, Gabe Kessel started getting headaches. These headaches and Gabe's vision would worsen over the following weeks.

On April 8th, after wrestling in a weekend tournament in Minnesota, Gabe was admitted to Regions Hospital's ICU. After two weeks filled with emergency surgeries, tests, and uncertainty, specialists had an answer met with devastation.

Gabe was diagnosed with an extremely rare and aggressive form of brain cancer: Diffuse Midline Glioma or DMG.

There's still more uncertainty. Mayo specialists are continuing to decode Gabe's DMG, pinning it down to its molecules.

What we do know about DMG:

• It has no known cure
• It's inoperable due to it's midline location in the brain
• Poor prognosis, even with the aggressive treatments

DMG, in short, is a type of brain tumor in the central nervous system that primarily affects children but can also affect older teens, as in Gabe's case. DMG is also very aggressive, with fewer than 10% of patients surviving two years from diagnosis and only 1% of patients surviving five years or more.