PORT ANGELES — Kendra Sullivan, 10, will indulge her passions for fame and fashion during a whirlwind tour of Seattle this weekend as the Make-A-Wish Foundation grants her wish to be famous for a day.
Actually, the team at the Seattle branch of the organization has arranged two days of shopping, sight-seeing and pampering for the Port Angeles girl suffering from pulmonary arterial hypertension, a life-threatening disease.
“I think we have done a fantastic job on this one,” said Jeannette Tarcha, director of communications at the Make-A-Wish Foundation.
“They’ll roll out the red carpet and spend a couple days making sure she feels really special.”
Tarcha said that the team has arranged a lot of surprises for Kendra.
Today, Kendra will have her hair done. That will be followed by seeing the sights in Seattle — in a limousine — and going on a shopping spree in Lynnwood’s Alderwood Mall.
“I really wanted to see all of Seattle because mostly, when I’m there, it is to go to the hospital,” Kendra said.
Surprise day
Although she knew her wish had been granted, she didn’t know when it would happen.
“My plan is to wake her up really early and surprise her that day,” her mother, Pam Sullivan, said Wednesday.
One would never know that the 10-year-old whose socks never match — that is her trademark look — suffers from pulmonary hypertension.
The only clue would be the fanny pack she carries everywhere. It carries a medicine pump to help her condition.
Pulmonary hypertension is characterized by high blood pressure. It can cause shortness of breath and narrowing of the arteries and blood clots. The cause is unknown, according to www.webmd.com.
Kendra was diagnosed with pulmonary arterial hypertension in 2006 after suffering from sleep apnea.
Because her mother, Pam, had holes in her heart repaired at 27, doctors ran an echocardiogram to check for abnormalities.
“I thought, surely, it won’t be that,” Pam said. “It couldn’t be. But then they found some really tiny ones.”
During surgery to fix her heart, doctors discovered signs of pulmonary arterial hypertension.
Sad diagnosis
She and Kendra’s father, Jim Sullivan, were pulled into a room with a doctor.
“He said he was sorry, but that she had PAH,” Pam said.
“That is one thing everyone knows — you don’t want to be pulled into a room with a doctor telling you they are sorry.”
The doctor told her that without medicine, Kendra probably would live only two more years.
“But with medicine, they are improving all the time,” Pam said. “Right now, they are saying 10-plus years.
“She is just like a normal little girl.
“She can’t play sports, but she wasn’t too keen on that anyway. She is much more passionate about art.”
Bring up her art and fashion designs and Kendra’s face lights up. She begins to talk energetically about drawing and someday attending the Seattle Institute of Art.
All of her fashion designs are bright and colorful. A few have been turned into real-life clothing.
“For a fashion show, her grandma helped her make a couple into outfits,” Pam said.
Shopping spree
Pam teased Kendra that on her shopping spree, she might have to buy some more mismatched socks.
“That’s her one rule — her socks are never allowed to match,” Pam said.
Good eating — at Red Robin and Chuck E. Cheese, a couple of Kendra’s favorites — will also be elements of her special weekend.
Topping off the weekend on Sunday, Kendra and her family will head to Mike’s Bikes in Sequim, where Pam’s fiance, Paul Ainsworth, arranged for her to get a new trike — a three-wheeled bike.
Also celebrating Kendra’s fame for the day will be her sister, Skyler Sullivan, and grandmother, Donna Grall.
The Make-A-Wish Foundation grants wishes to children with life-threatening illnesses, Tarcha said. A doctor or a nurse can nominate a child or a child — or a guardian — can nominate him- or herself.
The foundation works with health care providers to determine if nominated children qualify.
In order to qualify, a child must not have received a wish before, Tarcha said.
Each wish costs about $5,000 to grant. Since its inception in 1986, the Seattle regional office has granted about 4,000 wishes and will grant about 300 this year.
“That is the most we have ever done in one year,” Tarcha said.
For more information about the Make-A-Wish Foundation, visit www.northwestwishes.org.
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Reporter Paige Dickerson can be reached at 360-417-3535 or at paige.dickerson@peninsuladaily news.com.
