Jaxson's Service Dog Fundraiser

Jaxson came into our lives very quickly on September 18, 2015. He was a perfect, healthy baby at birth and was right on track with all of his milestones until one day we took him to Johns Hopkins All Children's Hospital in St Petersburg, FL with a 103 fever.  They hooked him up to an IV to rehydrate him and gave him Motrin for the fever and diagnosed him with a stomach bug. We left and he seemed to be getting better. Throughout the week, he didn't seem to be making much progress. He didn't have a favor, was eating a "normal" amount of formula. On Saturday, December 26, 2015, he started acting differently and completely stopped eating so we ended up taking him back to the ER at the All Children's Hospital on December 27, 2015. That is when they saw that he was having seizures and something was "not right."  They did all kinds of tests and CT scans and saw that he had developed hydrocephalus.  They brought in the neuro-surgeon for consultation and it was determined that he needed an External Ventricular Drain (EVD) to deal with that.  Samples of the fluids were taken to be tested to help determine the cause of everything.  It came back positive for Haemophilus Influenze (bacterial meningitis).  It wasn't until a few months later that it was discovered that it was type E (rare in the USA).  He was put on all kinds of antibiotics while in the hospital but damage to his brain was significant.  Since then, he's been diagnosed with Epilepsy (seizures) and Cerebral Palsy (CP).

He has made many small but HUGE improvements with the help of all of therapists and doctors.  We couldn't have gotten this far without them.  We have decided to start this to help us raise some funds to get Jaxson a service dog to help us in his recovery and lifetime of battles he will have to face.  

We have done many hours of research and it is hard to find somewhere that will train service dogs not only to alert/respond to seizure and help with mobility issues, but also trains dogs for young children/infants.  We found a place called Mountain High Service Dogs based out of Colorado Springs, CO. (For more information on them, go to http://mtnhighservicedogs.com/).  They require $2000 before they can start to find a dog for Jaxson and start the training process.  It takes about 18 months for the dog to go through the entire training process.  Once the dog has been through "boot camp" s/he is allowed to come home to us and start its life with us as another helping hand.  We have to have the remainder of the funds by the end of the "boot camp" period.  It costs about $12K total (including the $2K), but we are asking for a little more to help with the costs of buying plane tickets, hotel room, rental car, and time off work that Kent and I are going to have to take (possibly unpaid) to get to Colorado Springs, CO to get handler training for a week once the dog is done with his/her training.

We greatly appreciate everything and we will update as often as possible.  You can also find updates on Jaxson's Journey Facebook group.