ORCHARD PARK, N.Y. -- Buffalo Bills defensive tackle Kyle Peko's wife, Giuliana, announced Tuesday her cancer is in remission -- and earlier than expected.
Giuliana was diagnosed with stage 3 Hodgkin Lymphona in June, and was originally scheduled to undergo 12 sessions of chemotherapy over the course of the next six months.
However, just four treatments into her recovery, Giuliana received the news from her doctor that every patient and their family longs to hear.
"Yesterday she got a call from her doctor that the cancer is gone and nothing lit up," Peko said Wednesday. "I'm super ecstatic about it. My wife called me later on that day crying, super happy. She called me crying, so I wasn't sure what was going on, I wasn't sure what news I was about to hear. But then I got a smile out of her and she told me all the good news."
Smiling wide at his locker following Wednesday's practice, Peko said Giuliana's resilience was reminiscent of the message head coach Sean McDermott often conveys -- trust the process.
"Just seeing her trusting the process, as much adversity as she went through," Peko said, "she had to trust that what she was doing and that the plan that was set in motion was the right plan, and she had to follow through -- as hard as it was to do everything that she could to get better and reach that long-term goal. Fortunately it was sooner rather than later."
Peko signed with Buffalo in 2018 after two seasons with the Denver Broncos. He and Giuliana have been married since 2014 and have two children together.