Family and friends rally behind Azaiah Lopez in her fight against cancer

MUSCLE SHOALS, Ala. (WAFF) – 12-year-old Azaiah Lopez's fight is now the community's fight.

Muscle Shoals native Azaiah Lopez is going through his second round of battling leukemia. Particularly acute lymphoblastic leukemia. His family members said he was in remission for almost a year before the cancer recurred.

“He's going through some things that I don't even think I could do,” said his mother, Tiffany Lopez. “He is so strong. He doesn’t complain or anything.”

Azaiah Lopez was diagnosed with a rare form of leukemia in 2021.

After two long years of treatment, he was finally in remission.

However, everything changed a few weeks ago.

“So we got to a point where we started to feel normal,” Tiffany Lopez explained. “I was just about to sign him up for basketball through the rec center. One day he complained that his back hurt, and something inside me told me what it was.”

The cancer is back. He would have been in remission for a year from November 2024. His family was heartbroken. Tiffany Lopez said that Azaiah, however, is nothing but positivity and sunshine.

“Seeing your child in pain is one of the worst things, especially when it comes to cancer, because you want to take it away but you can't,” said Tiffany Lopez. All you can do is sit by and hope and pray for the best and carry them through the worst, and that’s really all you can do.”

This time the treatment needs to be more aggressive.

He will undergo aggressive chemotherapy for two months. His family hopes he will be back from Birmingham by Thanksgiving.

“I already talked to him about it looking like it was coming back,” Tiffany Lopez said. “I told him we’ve done this before and we’ll do it again.”

Tiffany and Kevin Lopez own and work at a tattoo and piercing shop in Muscle Shoals. For now, they can look after Azaiah and continue working.

However, after chemotherapy, Azaiah is scheduled to undergo a bone marrow transplant just before Christmas. This means his mother has to be with him 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

She said she even had to live in Birmingham for a few months to keep Azaiah close to the hospital.

With four other children, a business and a house to worry about, she said it will be difficult for the family to pull this off.

That's when her family friend Leslie Johnson decided to step in with a fundraiser idea.

Johnson said she became very close to the family as she also worked as a tattoo artist in the area. She said she understands when a loved one is battling cancer and wants to help as much as she can.

“We show community and love to our friends and industry colleagues,” Johnson said. “During these times, I think it’s very important to show small town communities standing up for each other. And so Azaiah can see that he has the entire Shoals behind him.”

In the parking lot of Infinite Artistry in Muscle Shoals, Johnson is organizing a market, a tattoo and piercing event where all the money will go to Azaiah and his family during the tough next few months.

More importantly, it is a chance for the community to show their support for this strong and courageous boy.

“This is a little boy who really needs his community right now,” Lopez said. “He needs this. It's really great how much it costs, Muscle Shoals is a great place. The community spirit here is simply untouched.”

The fundraiser includes raffles with prizes, tattoo specials, piercing specials, vendors and more. The event will be held in the parking lot near Infinite Artistry on Woodward Avenue in Muscle Shoals. It will take place on November 3rd from 1 p.m. to 7 p.m

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