Three-year-old Liam Shayton Awashish is seeing his dream come true this week — he is attending a Habs Stanley Cup final game at the Bell Centre.
The Innu boy from Mashteuiatsh, a First Nation community in Quebec’s Saguenay–Lac-Saint-Jean region, has been battling cancer and undergoing chemotherapy since the winter.
His wish came true when Josée Gagnon, co-founder of Clowns Thérapeutiques Saguenay — a non-profit that works to boost the moral and self-esteem of patients — called on her social media network.
She asked if anyone could help the young boy experience his dream of watching a Montreal Canadiens game live in Montreal.
“His mom wrote me, and within 40 minutes someone offered them two tickets,” Gagnon said. The tickets were given to them by Éric Larouche, a businessman from Chicoutimi.
The boy, who has been battling Langerhans cell histiocytosis — a type of cell cancer — will go to the game with his father.
Gagnon said the Sheraton Hotel is also putting them up for their stay and they have been given some extra spending money to treat themselves while in town.
“His cancer affects the bones,” his mother, Pamela Duciaume, told Global News. “It causes him a lot of pain. It’s unbearable for him, especially at night.”
Duciaume said recent playoffs games have been distracting him and giving him something to be excited about.
“After seeing the Canadiens win the last game, he said, ‘I want to go to the Bell Centre, I want to see Carey Price’ — that’s how this all started.”
Duciaume told her son that it wasn’t financially possible for them to get tickets. She still decided to give it a shot and reached out to the organization on Facebook.
She then saw her son’s dream come true within the hour.
“I like Carey Price,” Liam told Global News via Zoom on Monday.
“I’m crying with happiness,” Duciaume wrote on social media. She said she is incredibly grateful for how things have unfolded for her son.
“I am extremely happy for them. That family has been really challenged this year,” Gagnon said. “The treatment for that disease is extremely difficult for someone his age and the disease is hard to live with.”