During that year, Katelyn also relearned to eat, and the family’s first meal out was to CiCi’s Pizza, where Sharon and Ray sat patiently for six hours, watching Katelyn eat four slices. Under the cruel demands of chemotherapy, her young swimmer’s body, with solid muscle tone, heart-shaped calves, strong abs and shoulders, had dwindled to flesh and bones—fifty-eight pounds—skin stretched over skeleton. After a slow-dripping tube had kept her alive, kept her nutrition just where it needed to be, watching Katelyn eat each slice of pizza was like watching her get her life back, one bite at a time.
It was a year after waking from the coma that Katelyn’s eyesight returned, first by light, then shadows, then pinhole vision.
“They’re going to test your eyes and brain to see where the problem is,” Sharon explained as she drove Katelyn to an appointment one morning.
“Mom, I can see light,” Katelyn said as though it was something Sharon should already know.
“What do you mean you can see light?” she asked, looking at her daughter, trying to keep her car in its lane.
“It’s not just darkness anymore,” she said. “I can see some light.”
Sharon smiled at the thought that Katelyn’s world was slowly coming back to her. Her body, her mind, her spirit were waking up, slowly remembering how to live.
“Well, that ought to help them figure out what’s going on,” Sharon said, and within a week, objects became figures, figures turned into shadows, and those shadows eventually stepped into the light, creating sight that let Katelyn see the world through a piece of Swiss cheese. But at least she could see.
The other abilities Katelyn had lost and started to gain back—the ability to eat and walk and talk—worked with her body’s determination to exist, and every day grew stronger and stronger.
11
It was more than a year after waking from the coma that Katelyn’s relearned abilities gave her confidence and hope for a normal life.
“Let’s surprise Miss Penny!” she said excitedly to Sharon one afternoon.
Penny was the hospital receptionist, an older, grandmotherly type of woman with big smiles and even bigger hugs.
“There’s my girl,” she said every time she saw Katelyn. “Where’s my bear hug?”
Katelyn’s goal was to walk from the therapy ward to Penny’s desk.
“You got it,” Sharon said, then walked ahead of Katelyn to stand at Penny’s desk and watch.
As Katelyn pushed her walker slowly around the corner of the hall and started walking toward them, Sharon’s eyes welled up with tears. She pursed her lips, hoping they wouldn’t fall, but as they did, Penny wrapped her arms around Sharon.
“What’s the matter, sweetie?” Penny asked, squeezing Sharon tight. She hadn’t seen Katelyn yet.
With her head on Penny’s shoulder, Sharon smiled, wiped her tears, and turned her around slowly to face Katelyn.
“Oh my goodness!” Penny hollered, covering her mouth, clapping her hands. She quickly picked up the hospital’s paging system phone and shouted, “Attention St. Jude! Katelyn Atwell is walking!”
Katelyn, maintaining a turtle’s pace, had not yet made it halfway down the hall before it was filled with doctors and nurses who, nearly a year and a half before, believed she would not live longer than forty-eight hours, believed she would never wake up. They cheered, clapped, and cried as she made her way toward them, her bright, proud smile leading the way.
The same support continued for the next few months until Sharon got the phone call that would soon change their lives. She kept the call a secret from Katelyn and simply told her one morning that some people from the Make-A-Wish Foundation wanted to speak with her.
“Wow, Mom, look at this!” Katelyn said when a limo pulled up in front of their home.
She slid onto the car’s long, black, leather seat and pulled out her cell phone.
“I’m fixin’ to go talk with some people from Make-A-Wish!” Katelyn said excitedly to her mom’s best friend, “Aunt” Lyn. “I’m going to read them my poem!”
That’s all Katelyn knew, that she would read a poem she had written for her parents. She didn’t know that the local FedEx had chosen Make-A-Wish as their charity to support that year or that hundreds of golfers would be waiting to meet her, to hear her speak, at a golf tournament that would raise the funds for her wish. When she arrived at the tournament, event spokesperson Flynn Wallace introduced Katelyn to the crowd and asked her to read her poem.
“We want to give you an idea of why we’re out here raising money for this little girl,” he announced.
Katelyn had always been an honor roll student, a well-behaved child, but every one of her elementary school report cards stated the same thing: “excessive talking in class.” She wasn’t a wallflower or the pretty girl in the back of the class with opinions but no confidence to express them. She was a hand raiser, a voice. She didn’t mind crowds or strangers, and though her strong voice was now weak, her message was just as clear and just as strong.
She walked slowly onto the stage, took the microphone from Flynn, and began to recite her poem:
For the past two years, God has been closely monitoring me.
For the past two years, he has used you to fulfill my destiny.
For the past two years, your looks of grave concern have changed to astonished delight.
For the past two years, my eyes have gone from complete darkness to blessed sight.
For the past two years, tube feedings gave way to “real food” eating.
For the past two years, you have watched me go from lying to sitting, sitting to standing,
Standing to now taking steps.
For the next one hundred years, I could never find the words to say “Thank You” for getting me through the past two years.
Flynn kneeled beside Katelyn on the stage, head in hand. After she finished her poem and shared her story, he stood before the crowd, hundreds of teary-eyed golfers, and gathered himself.
“Katelyn, we know you’d like to go swim with the dolphins,” he said, pausing, forcing her to look with anticipation in his direction. When she did, he shouted, “And baby, you’re goin’!”
The crowd erupted and Katelyn shouted her best, “Woo-hoo!”
12
Two weeks later, Katelyn, Ray, Sharon, and Crystal were on a plane to Orlando, Florida, to spend a week at Discovery Cove. Thick, damp, hot air hit them in the face the moment they stepped outside, and in all its sticky misery, that humidity was familiar—it was home. They had moved from Jacksonville, Florida, to Memphis three years before, a lifetime ago, before sickness, hospitals, medicine, and surgery had defined them as a family.
While living in Jacksonville, Ray and Sharon had made the three-hour drive to Walt Disney World Resort and SeaWorld every year, when those places meant everything to a young child. And here they were again, as a whole family, which, for so long, they didn’t know if they would ever be again.
Before visiting SeaWorld, sitting in the splash zone of a Shamu show as they did when they were little girls, before riding Space Mountain at Walt Disney World, Katelyn’s wish came true. At Discovery Cove, Ray parked her wheelchair in the white sand and, because of the distance, carried her to the bright, blue water lagoon, where Dixie, Katelyn’s dolphin, was waiting.
A trainer by her side, Katelyn learned to send Dixie swimming backward and get the dolphin to wave her fins and jump toward the sky, all with a few motions of her hand. Ray and Sharon stood behind, supporting Katelyn’s body in the warm water as she played with the dolphin, free from everything.
Then, supported by a jacket, Katelyn sank into the water’s gentle grip, pushed and pulled her arms through it effortlessly. She closed her eyes, face pointed toward the hot sun, and felt her body relax, the weight of her illness, its burden, washing away. Ray, Sharon, and Crystal bobbed beside her, laughing as the dolphin danced through the salty water, brushing them with her fin, teasing.
They had spent countless hours, handfu
ls of summers, floating together as a family in the waters of Lake Broward in the small town of Pomona Park, Florida, where Ray grew up and where he and Sharon lived when their daughters were little. With the dolphin, they shared the same laughter, the same joy they had always found as a family, something Ray thought was gone until that moment.
“Grab on!” the trainer yelled, and Katelyn watched as Dixie, bottlenose smile leading the way, swam toward her. Katelyn waited patiently, her smile reflecting the dolphin’s, and threw her arms around Dixie’s dorsal fin as she swam quickly by. The force pulled against Katelyn’s fragile body, but her mind was stronger.
She held on with every ounce of determination inside of her, engaging every muscle she had worked so hard to strengthen for this very moment. The dolphin became her force, her power, as her own body had once been when she competed as a swimmer. Once again, Katelyn was plowing through water, the spray of it on her face, family in her wake watching through happy tears.
Katelyn would never become a competitive swimmer, her body and mind would never work quite the same, but she was not going to sleep through the rest of her life. That gift, that miracle alone, was something she and her family would never take for granted. As they had from the time Katelyn became ill, they would focus on what they had, not on what they did not have. And one thing they had was this day, this very special day of renewal and hope.
As Katelyn and Dixie circled the lagoon, Sharon and Ray knew it was a moment that would change them forever. They were no longer a family with a dying child, the hospital was no longer their second home, doctors were no longer their extended family. Their lives would no longer revolve around tests, surgeries, and medicine. They learned, in that moment, what the rest of their lives could be.
They could have fun; they could travel, and laugh, and make plans for their futures. Knowing she would always be in therapy, always work toward maintaining and gaining strength, Katelyn also knew, after her Wish trip, that there were no limitations. She got home from her trip and sat down with a pen and paper. She wrote:
Katelyn’s Bucket List:
- Ride a zip line
- Fly an airplane
- Sky dive
- Travel to Hawaii, Virginia, Hollywood, Washington, D.C., and New York
- Take a trip by train
Before her Wish trip, the farthest Katelyn had ever traveled from her Florida and Memphis homes were North Carolina and South Carolina to visit family. In the past thirteen years, since her original diagnosis, she has been to the White House in Washington, D.C., ridden on a subway in New York City, placed her palms in the hands of celebrities on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame, visited Thomas Jefferson’s house in Virginia, and walked the sandy beaches of Hawaii. She has flown an airplane over Deland, Florida, zip-lined at Mammoth Cave, Kentucky, and jumped from the belly of a plane.
All it took was one day, one moment, for Katelyn and her family to learn to live again.
13
“I thought you might like to know what it took to have me standing here tonight,” Katelyn said to a group of employees at the New York Stock Exchange a few months after returning from her Wish trip to Orlando. Inspired by what hope she had found on her trip—not only in her miraculous abilities but also in the reconnection she experienced with her family—Katelyn had made two commitments: to help grant five wishes by raising money for the Make-A-Wish Foundation and to pay St. Jude back every penny it took for them to save her life—$3 million.
She started by sharing her story with the world, one group at a time. She spoke to schools, hospitals, universities—any platform she could find—and sat down with individual investors and potential donors, gearing every speech, every point, to her audience.
“You’re number people, right?” she teased in New York. “For me to be here tonight, it took 203 days in the hospital—109 in the ICU—645 outpatient visits, 1,262 hours of rehabilitation, 81.5 hours with the psychology department, twenty brain surgeries, sixteen EEGs, twelve types of braces, two different wheelchairs, a walker, crutches, and a cane.”
As if they needed to hear more, she continued.
“I have no memory of 812 days. I missed my thirteenth and fourteenth birthdays. I had forty-three CAT scans, eighty-seven X-rays, and thirty-two MRIs. And $3 million of St. Jude’s money was spent on me. I plan to make a difference with my life. I also plan to personally raise back that $3 million for St. Jude so that, one day, every patient will be a miracle. None of my friends will have to die.”
In the past thirteen years, Katelyn, now twenty-six years old, has traveled roughly ten times a year for speaking engagements, organized twelve golf tournaments that, combined, have raised nearly $180,000, and has been sponsored for 5K runs, earning between $5,000 and $10,000 for each.
To date, she has raised $200,000 for St. Jude.
“Your life becomes nothing but the hospital,” Katelyn has explained to crowds of potential Make-A-Wish donors. “While most parents are taking their kids to soccer or football practice, mine were taking me to physical therapy. Other kids were doing all these things while I was just trying to learn to live again.”
Money resulting from Katelyn’s speeches, in addition to the one-hundred dollars she collected by selling handmade beaded bracelets—each with a dolphin bead to represent her wish, a shooting star bead to symbolize Wish children, and a wishbone bead to signify wishes—eventually added up to $25,000, enough to grant five wishes.
She continues to be a voice for the Make-A-Wish Foundation, and the message she sends with each speech, the message that lives on with the memories of her trip, is the same: My wish healed my spirit.
14
The moment Katelyn’s flame touched Sharon’s dark torch, something inside of her ignited. Shouts of her daughter’s name receded to hushed whispers surrounding her, as her black torch came to life with vibrant flames.
She did it.
Doctors had told Sharon and Ray countless times to call family, to make arrangements. They said Katelyn would never wake up. Never walk again. Never talk. Never eat or see or laugh or smile. Never, never, never …
But there Sharon was, with those same doctors watching through their tears on the sidelines as Katelyn reached her flame toward her mother’s, and Sharon knew in that moment that absolutely anything was possible and nothing would ever be taken for granted again.
Piles of unfolded laundry, aggressive drivers, a dirty house, running late—these things were once the culprits of ruined days. But laundry can be folded tomorrow, as can cleaning a house; impatient drivers must need to get somewhere quickly; running late means you have some place to go and the ability to go there.
Every day that Katelyn wakes up and crows like a rooster, happily saying, “Good morning, Mom,” is another day Sharon has with her daughter—a day they would not have if they had listened to those doctors, a day that would not exist if they had lost their faith.
Katelyn had missed her seventh- and eighth-grade school years, and when she had returned to ninth, Sharon rested against her car and watched as Katelyn was wheeled through the high school campus, her future waiting. She had a future to pursue, a reason for defying all medical statistics, a reason for living. Surrounded by the sounds of noisy buses, screaming teenagers, the hustle and bustle of school, Sharon watched as Katelyn re-entered life.
It was the same feeling she got when she turned from her daughter, red fire leading the way, and jogged with the Olympic torch for the next five blocks down the streets of Memphis. Tears poured from her eyes, once again drenching the city, and a smile crawled across her face. There was so much to look forward to—so much to run toward—and Katelyn would be a part of that race, a part of that journey.
Their Wish trip had taught them to enjoy life, regardless of limitations, in spite of difficulties. It showed them how.
Their journey had made life’s small problems disappear, and that walk, that experience of carrying the torch—a dream that had once been Katelyn’s to carry an Olympic medal—
was a reminder of how far they’d come and how far they could go.
• STORY THREE •
Brittney Wolfe
“Cherish yesterday, dream tomorrow, live today.”
—T’Ann Wolfe
1
SHE JUMPS, I jump, T’Ann thought, peeking over the side of the swaying boat into the dark water below. It splashed gently against hundreds of shiny fins that sliced through the tepid water, circling her daughter, who was bobbing in the waves. Brittney had fearlessly stood beside the tour boat guide just a few moments before and plunged right in. The water around her crawled with shadowy movement, and T’Ann watched nervously as Brittney poked her goggles through the surface to get a closer look at the reef sharks surrounding her. T’Ann plugged her nose, scrunched her face, and jumped, reminding herself as she hit the water, She jumps, I jump.
Over the past eighteen months, those mirrored words began to define everything in T’Ann’s life. Brittney’s battle with cancer was her battle. The time she spent in remission, cancer-free, was T’Ann’s freedom. The tears Brittney cried were hers, too. They shared joys and fears, heartache and triumph. T’Ann had promised Brittney they would do everything together on Brittney’s Make-A-Wish trip, even if it meant swimming with sharks. The promises they made to each other were kept, and it was Brittney who had kept the most important promise of all.
“Brittney, it’s over,” Dr. Meltzer said quietly as he stood above her small, tired body. “Can you hear me?”
A thin sheet hugged her as the doctor’s voice poked through the fog in her waking mind. Her cracked lips remained still beneath her pale cheeks as the sunlight crawled through the small window of her third-story hospital room, illuminating her dark brown, shoulder-length hair. Brittney knew before the surgery that the doctor would cut the hair she had worn past her shoulders since she was a little girl, so her mom, T’Ann, had taken her to one of those fancy salons to get a cute, short style she would enjoy after it was over.
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