Love for Lucy & Landon

Lucy's brother Landon was also diagnosed with SCID. Darrell and Mary now have three of their four children involved in bone marrow transplants and two recieving chemo. We are all heartbroken. 3/15/2024 Update

This is Lucy. She just turned seven years old. Lucy and her family needs our help. Lucy has been very sick several times and has had a wound on her leg that would not heal regardless of what doctors did to help her. Lucy has been in Brenner’s Children’s Hospital for three weeks as doctors from all around the country have been working on her case trying to diagnosis her illness. Lucy and her twin sister, Lani are 1st graders at Glade Creek School in Ennice, NC. Lucy has two brothers, Landon and Levi. Lucy’s dad is our school’s resource officer (SRO), affectionately called, “Officer Darrell”. Darrell works hard to support his family and help our small community. He is on the Glade Creek Volunteer Fire Dept., He coaches youth sports, volunteers for security at special events, Darrell is always willing to help others in need. Most of all, he is an amazing dad. Lucy’s mom, Mary also works hard, volunteers by coaching youth cheerleading and is a dedicated, amazing mom. Both Darrell and Mary have missed weeks of work while staying at the hospital day and night. Meanwhile, bills continue to arrive and medical cost continues to mount.

After three weeks at Brenner’s, they received a diagnosis that no parents would want to hear. Lucy has been diagnosed with Severe Combined Immunodeficiency (SCID) Severe combined immunodeficiency (SCID) is a group of rare, life-threatening diseases that cause a child to be born with very little or no immune system. As a result, the child’s body is unable to fight off infections and can become very sick from infections like chickenpox, pneumonia and meningitis. SCID is considered to be a life threating disease.

SCID is commonly called the “bubble boy disease” or “boy in the bubble” syndrome, SCID became widely known in the 1970s and ’80s due to the publicity and later a movie about David Vetter, a boy with X-linked SCID, who lived in a plastic, germ-free bubble for 12 years.

Lucy is considered a critically ill little girl. Tomorrow the family will be heading to The National Institute of Health in Bethesda, Maryland. Doctors there have told them this is a serious case and that they need to see Lucy and all her siblings. Lucy’s siblings must be tested for the same gene as well. If they are also carriers of SCID, treatment plans need to start right away. As Lucy is just one of two cases like this in the United States, she will be part of a research study.

In the middle of all this heartache, Darrell’s father is in the hospital fighting cancer. Please help this family if you can. If you can’t help them monetarily, please keep them all in your prayers.