Ethan's Therapy Fund

This little guy’s name is Ethan and he has an amazing story.  He was born 3 years ago with meningitis and today is battling sever cerebral palsy as a result.  The purpose of our GoFundMe campaign is to provide our friends, family and anyone else who is interested an opportunity to support Ethan and the cost involved in the extensive physical therapy he needs.  For those of you who know our family, you know we are one hundred percent committed to providing him with every opportunity to maximize his recovery and improve his quality of life, and for those of you who know Ethan you know this little guy loves life and refuses to be defined by his limitations.

Why are we here?

As you might have guessed Ethan is in therapy, and lots of it.  He has weekly physical, speech and occupational therapy that is provided by the school system.  However, his doctors have explained that this is not enough to adequately treat the severity of his injuries.  For Ethan to progress, he needs prolonged periods of intensive physical therapy in order to strengthen and train his muscles to work correctly.  In order to accomplish this goal our family takes one trip every year down to Tampa for Three weeks.  During this time, Ethan undergoes extensive therapy for several hours a day focusing on core strengthening and muscle tone as well as cognitive development and patterning for movement.  At the end of the three weeks we come home with our “homework” which is a set of daily exercises that he does with his local therapists, family and caregivers to continue to reinforce and maintain what he has learned. 

Is this effective?  Absolutely!  I am happy to report that since we have started with the intensive therapy program we have seen steady improvements in Ethan, especially since his last round in September.  Since September of 2014, he has gone from barely  able to roll over, to crawling on his belly and now starting to learn to step with the assistance of his gait trainer.  His physical strength as well as his motor control has improved dramatically.  His doctors have been very impressed and have encouraged us to continue with our current methods as much as possible.

To get an Idea of what Ethan does, Here is a video my wife did last year.  (Credit to the Authors and owners of the music)


Of course the marathons to Tampa are not cheap and they are NOT covered by insurance in any way.  That is why we are here.  We are setting up this campaign to provide our friends, family, and anyone else interested with the opportunity to support Ethan’s therapy needs.  Each year, many of our extended family and friends have expressed desires to help with Ethan’s therapy needs but have not known how to do so.  This year we decided to setup this campaign to give anyone interested in helping an opportunity to do so.  What’s it take to send Ethan to Tampa? Just over 6 thousand dollars!

What will your money go twards?

The bulk of the money donated goes to pay for the intensive treatments themselves.  Ethan attends Lamperts Therapy group in Largo Florida and the cost of his treatments for this session will run $3,350.  Along with the treatments there is lodging for Ethan the family or care givers that travel with him as well as food fuel.  Here is our budget breakdown for the upcoming trip.

Physical Therapy              $3,350   
Lodging                                   $2000
Food                                          $500
Fuel                                           $300

More about Ethan

For more information about Ethan, and his story, feel free to look me up on Facebook and view the timeline between October and November of 2011.  This gives a play by play of what happened and why we are here today. 

I will be working to put more information together for those of you who do not know his story but feel free to message me with any questions you might have.

For more about his therapy you can vist the following links

My Facebook -- look at 2011 timeline

Lamperts Therapy

Hyperbaric Therapy