Former Make-a-Wish recipient now granting wishes for other sick kids | 24CA News
For Katrina Secord, life hasn’t at all times been a stroll within the park.
She was identified at beginning with cystic fibrosis (CF), a lethal genetic dysfunction primarily affecting the digestive system and the lungs of youngsters and younger adults.
There is not any treatment and when she was born, the common life expectancy for somebody with CF was 18 years.
The persistence and ongoing an infection within the lungs, with destruction of tissue and lack of lung operate, will finally result in demise within the majority of individuals with CF.
Being instructed she would most likely solely stay to 18 isn’t one thing anybody needs to listen to. Growing up out and in of the hospital, grade faculty wasn’t straightforward for Secord.
“I was very singled out. I looked different, I looked sick when I was sick,” Secord stated.
“It was something that I was always really, really self-conscious of.”
Having totally different challenges each day, some more durable than others, it began to put on on her drive to combat the illness and stay a cheerful, fulfilling life. She grew to become an angsty teenager.
“I didn’t see that there was going to be a future,” Secord stated.
“Because that’s what I had been told since birth, that it’s 18 — so make right now count.”
Katrina Secord, pictured as a teen, is a former Make-A-Wish child who now at 30 works within the Edmonton chapter as a growth officer.
Supplied to Global News
Her medical group determined to achieve out to Make-A-Wish Foundation to assist carry her spirits.
Little did Secord know, it will change her life without end.
“When I was referred for the wish I was 14 and I just really hated being different. So this was all another reason for me being different,” stated Secord.
“I was like, ‘I don’t want this at all.’ This is not something I cared about.’”
Meeting with the muse in May of that yr, her one want was to go to Germany to satisfy her prolonged household. By August, Secord was on a airplane to Deutschland, accompanied by her grandma, mom and two siblings.
“This organization did something for me and not my disease — just me,” Secord stated with a smile.
“It was kind of what I needed to reinvigorate my spirit and just know that I’m more than my disease.”
When Secord returned to Edmonton, this new fireplace inside made her wish to fundraise as a lot as doable and assist others.
‘Over the years once we have been fundraising a lot, there are extra medicine which can be obtainable and extra remedy that’s funded and extra analysis performed,” Secord stated.
“So it almost became a race against the clock as I grew older.”
Katrina Secord, pictured as a teen on the University of Alberta hospital, is a former Make-A-Wish child who now at 30 works within the Edmonton chapter as a growth officer.
Supplied to Global News
There are 4 medicine obtainable in Canada to deal with the illness, known as cystic fibrosis transmembrane conductance regulators or CFTR modulators. There are Kalydeco, Orkambi, Symdeko and Trikafta.
Secord stated she’s tried all of them. She tried each remedy that got here out, joined each examine doable, took all of the drug she was eligible for.
She was on Orkambi when Global News spoke together with her in 2017, saying on the time it modified her life: she was capable of work as a therapeutic massage therapist, train, achieve weight (one thing she struggled with) and plan for the long run.
But the prescription value $250,000 annually and her insurance coverage protection ended, prompting the then 25-year-old to beg the Alberta authorities to cowl the price. She started to backslide, shedding pounds and lung operate.
The fundraising didn’t cease for her, although — she simply did it from her hospital mattress.
“Then about two years ago, I was really close to transplant and not making it entirely,” she stated.
Secord stated she tried Symdeko, and from there about two years in the past switched to Trikafta — which she stated of all of the remedies, made her really feel 1,000,000 instances higher. Rather than simply treating signs, Trikafta targets the fundamental defect from one particular genetic mutation that causes CF.
“These gene-modifying drugs came on the scene and really changed everything.”
It modified all the things — a lot so, Secord is now 30 years outdated and wholesome.
CF has left its mark: her physique is broken with scar tissue and from present process surgical procedures, however Secord stated her lung capability is now at 65 per cent — the very best it’s ever been.
It’s a far cry from the 20 per cent of her lung operate she struggled with a number of years in the past. It was so unhealthy, she stated her medical group started to think about making ready her to affix the transplant checklist.
“I went from that to two years clean from hospital, no IVs, no antibiotics, and have stopped most of my treatment from this one gene-modifying drug that has made it possible for me to work.”
When she was born, a CF prognosis was a demise sentence. Now, life expectancy has improved to about 52 years of age as science has superior. Secord thinks that can simply hold rising.
In 2021, the Alberta authorities introduced for Albertans 12 years of age and older, it will begin masking Trikafta — which prices about $300,000 a yr, per affected person. Last summer season, it expanded protection to children aged six to 11.
Secord instructed Global News she is out of hospital and off different medicine, simply taking a number of Trikafta capsules a day and capable of work like an everyday individual. It’s not only a common job although — it’s one which mixes her ardour of fundraising at a spot that modified her life.
“The job posting came open for Make-A-Wish, and I said absolutely, I’m going home. Now, I’m home,” stated Secord with an enormous smile on her face.
She’s now a growth officer with Make-A-Wish Canada and helps to make the goals of different children, together with these with CF, come true.
With greater than 321 needs to fill throughout northern Alberta and Northwest Territories, Secord hopes to boost over $200,000 this yr.
She’s centered on two fundraisers within the upcoming months: The Heroes Challenge on May 3 at West Edmonton Mall, which goals to boost $100,000, and the inaugural Make-A-Wish Grand Slam Slo-Pitch Tournament on the ballpark out in Devon. Teams are requested to decide to to elevating $5,000 by recreation day, which is Aug. 25 – 26.
“We are the next generation of changemakers and people that are really going to make a difference in the world.
“And I think CFer’s are all fighters at heart.”
While she has centered a lot of her life on elevating cash for others, Secord was just lately instructed to get a retirement financial savings plan for herself — one thing she hadn’t deliberate on as a result of she by no means anticipated to stay lengthy sufficient to make use of it.
“This is going to actually happen!” she laughed.
According to Cystic Fibrosis Canada, there are about 4,300 Canadian kids, adolescents, and adults residing with the illness.
