Chase’s wheels

Shannon LeClair
Times Reporter

 

Chase Andersen was exactly 11 months old when he was diagnosed with Cystic Fibrosis (CF). The fatal lung disease affects all of the body’s organs, mainly targeting the lungs and digestive tract.
“It’s like drowning from the inside out because the thickness of the mucus in his lungs, he can’t move it very well and he continually has a cough even though he doesn’t have a cold,” said Brandy Andersen, Chase’s mom.
Just before New Year’s Chase, who is now eight and a half years old, was admitted to the Alberta Children’s Hospital (ACH) for two weeks. Brandy is a single mom who works as a school bus driver. During the first week Chase was admitted school was out, and during the second week when school was back in she had to leave the Children’s Hospital at four in the morning, come into Strathmore, do her school run, which goes out to Hussar, get everything done that she needed and head back to the hospital again.
It was tiring, said Andersen. That’s when there were bad snow storms and her van was already acting up, and she had kept her fingers crossed every day that she would make it to her destination.
After putting a newer motor in the van she was still having issues. Andersen’s friend Joey Kauenhofen said enough was enough; she created a GoFundMe page to help the mom raise enough money for a new vehicle.
“The reason I set up the fundraiser for Brandy and Chase is because she is a very giving, generous person who has it rough,” said Kauenhofen.
“Her son has CF and they spend a lot of time at ACH, she also spends a lot of time worrying about him … I wanted her to have one less thing to worry about.
“Her van has broken down so many times, she keeps putting money into it because she (had) no other option, so I thought if we could get it running reliably or get her into something else … she doesn’t have to worry.”
Since the GoFundMe page was created Andersen’s ex has helped her finance a 2012 Ford Fiesta.
“This town is amazing for helping, I don’t even know what the fund is (at) but anything that goes is going towards payments on the car,” said Andersen.
“Chase is even super excited about the car, he had tears in his eyes. When we’d be driving the van, every time it would make a stutter he was like ‘please don’t let it break down now van’ he would kind of rub it. Pretty bad for my eight-year-old to be telling my van not to break down.”
Besides helping with costs of the car, Andersen said any additional money raised through the GoFundMe page will help with her costs of going to the hospital. It can be pricey to go to ACH, you have to pay for parking, plus food and the cost of gas to commute back and forth for work and when Chase is admitted it’s just under $100 for parking
“It just becomes a lot in general and I try and give him the best possible that I possibly can for his life, I try and do many things that I can,” said Andersen.
“We go to the Children’s one to two times a month, last year it was probably over 20 times that we went because he was sicker last year, I always seemed to be going to the Children’s Hospital.”
Chase is on a nebulizer, a machine that creates a mist with the medication poured into it.
He also does physiotherapy about 30 minutes later using a Vibratory Pep machine, which creates backpressure in his lungs that helps move the mucus out.
With the mucus building up in his lungs and being so thick he is more prone to infections, he has a fungus in his lungs that they can’t seem to get rid of, he is allergic to all the anti-fungal medications, was on steroids for two years which weren’t working, and he now goes for injections every month to kind of bind the allergies in his lungs so that he can breathe without extra coughing.
“He takes about 32 pills a day and that’s without any extra added on antibiotics or any of the other stuff added to it. He has to take pills with each meal, and it’s pancreatic enzymes, so that he can absorb his food,” said Andersen.
“If you looked at him right now you would not think he was any different than any other kid out there. It is tough listening to him cough and knowing that there’s something right there that he just can’t get out and your helpless, just sitting there.
“Its tough when he says he doesn’t want to take pills anymore because he’s the only one in school or around that’s has to take pills when he’s eating, its tough when he’s got eczema and he sweats and his skin is burning and everything is burning his skin, but then you watch him with (a) big smile on his face.”
To donate go to http://www.gofundme.com/chaseswheels.