Jordan Wright is a 12-year-old boy who loves toy cars and loves to go on amusement park rides.
But Jordan finds it difficult to walk and is confined to a wheelchair part-time with Duchenne muscular dystrophy, an inherited neuromuscular degenerative disease that, over time, breaks down the muscles in the body.
Symptoms usually occur between the ages of one- and six-years-old and many people are confined to a wheelchair by the time they are Jordan’s age.
In 2008, Jordan went on a trip of a lifetime. Through the Sunshine Foundation of Canada, Jordan left the comforts of home for the first time in his life. He waved goodbye to his parents and boarded a plane for Disneyland in California.
“It was a little nerve-wracking,” says Tiina, Jordan’s mother, smiling as she remembers the occasion. “But you know that they are with professional doctors and nurses that go on the trip.”
The Sunshine Foundation of Canada provides dreams for children who have severe physical disabilities as well as life-threatening illnesses. Founded in 1987 by a London, Ontario police officer who lost his own son to muscular dystrophy, the foundation has made dreams come true for 6,700 children across the country.
Called DreamLifts, around 80 children are given a one-day trip to an exciting destination of choice. There is a Dreamlifts in the Lower Mainland once every four years.
The next lift will take place in 2012 and for the past two years The Sunshine Foundation of Canada has been actively fundraising to hopefully send 100 children on a dream-fulfilling trip.
The Meadow Gardens Golf Club will be hosting a fundraising golf tournament to raise money for the 2012 DreamLifts on Sept. 16. The tournament will be a best ball Texas scramble with numerous food and drink holes along the course.
All proceeds, less golf course fees, will go to children living in the Lower Mainland who have requested dreams from the Sunshine Foundation.
The average cost of a DreamLifts is $300,000.
Tiina says her son came back a different boy.
“He went on the plane nervous and he got off the plane confident,” and independent, she says.
On his trip, she added, Jordan was just like everyone else, not pointed at or looked at or judged.