Make-A-Wish® with Don Yaeger - Wish Granted: 25 Stories of Strength and Resilience from Americas Favorite Athletes

All photographs are courtesy of Make-A-Wish except where noted.

This is a work of nonfiction. The events and experiences detailed herein are all true and have been as faithfully rendered as the authors can represent them, to the best of their abilities. Some names, identities, and circumstances have been changed in order to protect the privacy and/or anonymity of the various individuals involved.

WISH GRANTED: 25 Stories of Strength and Resilience from Americas Favorite Athletes. Copyright 2014 by Make-A-Wish Foundation of America. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or here in after invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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FIRST EDITION

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Make-A-Wish Foundation.

Wish granted : 25 stories of strength and resilience from Americas favorite athletes / Make-A-Wish Foundation.

pages cm.

ISBN 9780062218391

EPub Edition April 2014 ISBN 9780062218421

1. AthletesUnited StatesConduct of life. 2. AthletesUnited StatesPsychology. 3. Make-A-Wish Foundation. I. Title.

GV706.55.M34 2014

796.01dc23 2013041008

14 15 16 17 18 RRD(H) 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

Wish Granted is dedicated to all the heroesathletes, celebrities, and other extraordinary peoplewho have helped Make-A-Wish grant hundreds of thousands of life-changing wishes. By granting wishes, you have influenced the lives and health of thousands of wish kids around the worldthe true impact of your compassion and generosity is immeasurable. These wishes have captured the world, inspired communities, and most importantly instilled hope and joy in children and families when they needed it most. We are forever grateful.

Every year in the United States alone, approximately twenty-seven thousand children are diagnosed with a life-threatening medical condition. Twenty-seven thousand. It breaks your heart, doesnt it?

I ve worn a lot of hats in my day, but the one that I think I might be most proud of is Chief Wish Ambassador for Make-A-Wish. Each year, the foundation grants wishes for roughly 14,000 seriously ill childrena number that has been increasing every year since 1980. Next year, Im sure the number will be even higher. Its a wonderful record to continue breaking because it means we are reaching more and more kids, but its also a terrible number because it means that children continue to get sick.

Ive always had a soft spot for kids charities. For years I have partnered with groups like Make-A-Wish, Special Olympics, and Ronald McDonald House because it means the world to me that children and families with special needs and facing such big challenges might get even a little encouragement from my involvement. Thats an incredible and humbling feeling.

Its tough sometimes as an athlete to decide to which charities you should dedicate your time and influence, because the need is so great and there are so many wonderful causes out there. One of the many reasons that Make-A-Wish in particular is so near to my heart is that they arent specialized in terms of who they serve; in other words, a three-year-old with a congenital heart condition is as much a part of their demographic as is a sixteen-year-old battling leukemia. They dont focus on just one type of disease or one specific age group. Their goal is to grant wishes to as many seriously ill children as possible. Period.

Thats a pretty talland pretty amazingorder. Those of us who have the honor of getting to participate in granting those wishes are a very lucky group. Just the knowledge that a childs one wish, more than anything else in the world, is to meet youthat is better than anything else you can accomplish in life: better than any athletic accolade you might receive or award you might be given or record you might set. It means that you have earned someones respect to such a degree that a visit from you, a chat, maybe a photograph, is something that inspires them so much they want to keep fighting whatever life-threatening condition might be plaguing them. It gives me goose bumps just thinking about it.

Ive been privileged enough over the last two decades to be a part of two hundred wishes, and Im not exaggerating when I say that each one was special to me in its own way. Its hard to pick out one particular wish that stands out, since thats almost like asking a parent to pick their favorite child, but I do remember one young woman named Katie back in 2002, who had been diagnosed with malignant tumors in her brain. I happened to be granting wishes in Washington D.C. that year and was visiting with a roomful of wish kids and their families. Everyone had basketballs they wanted signed, or maybe some shoes. Each family was seated at their own table, and after talking to the room as a whole, I went from table to table to talk with each kid and their siblings and parents individually and take some photos. When I got to Katies table, her family was obviously very excited to see me, but she seemed a little shy and tongue-tied. I wanted to make sure that she got the special experience she was hoping for. This was her wish, after all, so after talking a bit with her family, I turned to Katie and asked her, Is there anything you want? She just looked up at me and squeaked out, Can I have a hug?

Something inside me absolutely melted at those words. Here is this sweet kid who has been through so much, and all she wants from me is a hug! It was awesome. She was crying, her parents were crying, and I choked up, too. In that one moment, I was reminded exactly why it is that I want to work with Make-A-Wish. Thats what its all about.

But thats not the end of Katies story. A few years ago, I learned that she not only triumphed over her illness, she is now grown up and, for a while, worked for Make-A-Wish. It was awesome to learn about her life over the past ten years, to hear about her graduating from school and going on to college and how her illness will always be something she has to be aware of but that is not front and center in her life anymore. Having her wish granted meant so much to her that she was determined to someday help make wishes come true for other children, which meant that she had to first overcome her cancer. The best parallel I can make to my own life was my desire to have a Hall of Fame career. I was so set on reaching that goal that I was motivated to practice longer and work harder than anyone else so that I would have a shot. Finding out that a wish in which I had a part inspired that same kind of drive, except with infinitely higher stakes, was pretty incredible.