Most kids love getting outdoors and one six-year-old Oshawa boy with epilepsy will now be able to experience it regularly after having a wish granted. Atticus Porter’s family hopes to make lasting memories in their new RV.
Atticus Porter is six years old. Unfortunately, he is unable to verbally express his love for the outdoors.
“The way his face lights up, his face will tell you everything, and his eyes, I’ve never seen a light shine so bright,” said Melissa Springstead, Atticus’ Mom.
Atticus has epilepsy. He began having seizures at just four and a half months old. Hundreds of them daily. It’s now down to anywhere between three and ten a day.
“Watching your child have a seizure and regress from the medications and the seizures are not easy, I don’t know how we get through it but we do, I put one foot in front of the other, we live day to day, one day at a time,” said Springstead.
One thing the family will be doing more often is camping. That’s because Atticus and his family received a new RV thanks to Make a Wish Canada and Go RVing.
“I have not seen my child that excited in six years, so that in itself is a huge gift,” said Springstead.
“The generosity of people, just how big their hearts are really, to see people with special needs children and without special needs children all coming together to make one child’s wish come true, like what beats that really? What beats putting a smile on a kid’s face?” said Terence Porter, Atticus’ Dad.
Make a Wish Canada granted 615 wishes last year, with the hope of increasing that number to 650 in 2018.
“We know what a wish can do and we know the power that a wish has on a family and a child, so to see that in their faces and their smiles and their eyes is incredible,” said Alyson Geary, a representative of Make a Wish Canada.
While summer officially starts this week, planning their camping getaways is already in full swing.
“We want to go to Napanee, we want to go out to Pickton and Haliburton, we have lots of plans that before the summer we weren’t able to plan, we weren’t able to think about, now the plans are limitless,” said Springstead.
“We’re going to get him out in the fresh air, we’re going to just enjoy camping,” said Porter.
Having the home away from home on wheels allows Atticus and his family to not only enjoy the outdoors, but also to create lasting memories.
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