Here is a bit about who they are, from www.kennaskids.org:
Kenna's Kids Pays It Forward
The basis of our nonprofit organization is built around the pay-it-forward concept. The growth of our organization and support of additional families will come from those that we have helped in the past. We are excited about the future of Kenna’s Kids and honored to be able to support emotionally and financially many more families in the future.About Us
"Kenna's Kids is a nonprofit organization that reaches out to individual families with children experiencing life's medical challenges at a young age."Our daughter, Kenna, was born with metopic synostosis, a condition in which the front of her skull was abnormally fused shut. Therefore, her skull did not accommodate her rapidly growing brain as it should, leading her to require a cranial vault when she was 9 months old. For four weeks prior to the procedure, Kenna received weekly injections of procrit. Then, once the surgery was complete, she only stayed 2 days and 1 night in the PICU followed by 1 day and night on the regular floor before being discharged. The only complication from her stay in the hospital was a ruptured ear drum after developing a post-operative ear infection.
Ultimately, the medical bills resulting from the correction of Kenna’s skull totaled to $100,015.98. We were blessed to have insurance coverage of over 90% of the bills at the time of Kenna’s surgery. The remaining portion of our out-of-pocket expenses were further taken care of by the generosity of so many individuals who participated in a fundraising golf tournament organized as a surprise to us by our friends, Jeremy and Kat Pigott. In addition to providing enough to cover our out-of-pocket expenses at 100%, the “Kenna Cup“ left us with a small surplus.
Having been blessed to come home with our child well taken care of as well as our finances from the procedure fully covered, we wanted to share the kindness and generosity that had been shown to us. We looked at many options for use of the additional funds generated. In doing so, we became aware of a variety of situations where families were facing difficult medical challenges for their children. We found that there are numerous families of children requiring major surgeries and of those families, many have very poor insurance coverage or no coverage at all. Additionally, there are a lot of children with complications requiring much longer stays in the hospital and a handful more who need repeated surgeries. Certainly, the medical bills that accrue from all of these situations are overwhelming. Thus, the decision of where to donate the money was very difficult. We wanted to be sure that it would definitely go toward the reduction of medical expenses for someone.
Finally, the idea of creating a foundation in Kenna’s honor emerged. Since the Kenna Cup was such a successful event and those that played had a lot of fun, making it an annual event benefiting other families seemed like the best way to truly make an impact. After collaboration with key contributors to the first event, we received the commitment and assistance necessary to move forward with the idea. Therefore, we chose to spend the remaining funds creating the entity, Kenna’s Kids, led by Matt Kucholtz and Jeremy Pigott.
We can not fully express our gratitude for all that has been given to us both financially as well as emotionally. We are also incredibly excited that through the generosity and support of so many people surrounding us throughout Kenna’s challenge, we have been provided with the inspiration and ability to further help other families!
~Matt and Sunshine
If you would like to help contribute by getting a discounted massage, please contact me to make an appointment! There are a limited number of massages that I can dedicate to Helping Hands, so make sure you book your spot as soon as possible! The minimum donation is $40, but of course you are free to donate more if you wish. For more details on Helping Hands and how it works, please visit the Helping Hands page.
<3 Dana
