| Lathan Lucas DreamHunt May 25 2011 Weekend |
Dear SCSD, Thanks to all of the people that helped with the dream hunt. I appreciate you picking me. Mr. Claude thank you for all the gifts that y’all gave me. Mr. Berry thank you for teaching me how to shoot and taking me turkey hunting. You were a very good teacher and turkey caller. It was the best day of my life. Charles thanks for fishing with me. I had a really fun time fishing. I wanted to thank you for giving me the opportunity to fish with Jimmy Houston. We had a good time fishing and talking about about sports & fishing stories. I really enjoyed our day together. Thanks for everything y’all did this was the greatest weekend ever. Thanks for the memories, Lathan Lucas Dear Claude and SCSD, Lathan & I would like to thank everyone for all that they have done to make the 2011 Dream Hunt possible. You can never imagine what a lasting impression this has made on Lathan. He had never been hunting before this day. He was not only able to shoot his first turkey but he also won the Big Bird Contest at Anderson’s. It means so much to me to be able to share this with him. He still has not stopped smiling from that weekend. He also is still wearing the turkey feather in his hat that you gave him. I would like to give a special thanks to Barry Blouser for all your time and patience with teaching Lathan how to shoot. I’m so glad that you got to see Lathan kill his first turkey. Johnny thanks for filming Lathan on his hunt. You did a great job filming. Charles I also wanted to thank you for taking time to fish with Lathan during this weekend. He really enjoyed fishing with you and thanks for the autographed football. I would also like to thank Dr. Martin & Paul Akins for cooking for us. And thanks to all the people that came during the weekend to cook. All the food was amazing. I also wanted to thank you for letting Lathan fish with Jimmy Houston. He really enjoyed the day that they spent fishing. This weekend was more than just hunting and fishing. It was about making friendships that would last a lifetime. This was such an incredible weekend and I’m glad we got to share it with all of you. I just want you to know how appreciative I am for everything you did for Lathan. And I hope that you can see how blessed I am to have him. I found out that Lathan was sick when I was three months pregnant. He was diagnosed with autosomal recessive polycystic kidney disease. The doctors did not give him very much chance for survival. But thru God’s blessings, we just celebrated his fourteenth birthday. With this disease, the cysts build up in the kidneys and destroy them. There is no cure to this disease. The only alternative is a kidney transplant. This is not an easy fix because the kidney can be rejected or other complications occur. Lathan does not have much function left in either kidney. I believe that God blesses him every day with the energy and determination to make it just a little while longer. The doctors say that with the damage in his kidneys that he has a round two years before they fail. The dream hunt weekend took a lot out of him. He was very tired and it took him several days to get his energy back. But to him it was all worth it. He would not trade it for all the energy in the world. There’s one thing that you learn from Lathan. It’s all the little moments in life that really matter. That’s what I cherish the most about him and I thank God for blessing me with him. Thank you all so much for your kindness and hospitality, Susie Oliver and Lathan Lucas |
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