A Colorado teacher is currently going through the process of adopting his student so that he can save his life.
Damien is a 13 year-old boy who suffers from focal segmental glomerulosclerosis, which has left him in desperate need of a kidney transplant. Unfortunately, he is not currently eligible to receive one because he is homeless, as he has been in the foster care system for years due to the high cost of his medical problems. When there is no home available for him, Damien is forced to just live in the hospital.
After learning that he was being sent to live at the hospital, Damien had to tell Finn Lanning, his math teacher at AXL Academy, that he would not be coming back. Finn wasn’t about to let this happen, and he miraculously offered to adopt Damien so that he would have a home and be eligible for the transplant he needed.
“When you’re living in the hospital, you’re not able to be on the transplant list because folks who don’t have stable housing are considered high-risk for their organ not to work,” Finn said, adding that Damien had already spent three or four months living in the hospital because no home was available.
“Over that time, I started out going in to give him his work and just hang out with him a little bit, keep him caught up in the classroom,” Finn continued. “And as I learned more about his story and what he was facing and what his needs were and why they weren’t being met, it just became really hard for me to look the other way.”
Finn’s decision to adopt Damien got the seventh grader out of the hospital and to the top of a transplant list.
“Damien is now living with me, going back to school, and was just recently relisted on the kidney transplant list,” Finn said.
Sadly, Damien’s medical condition requires him to maintain a strict diet, which has been costly for Finn to fund. Since their grocery bill was running between $200 and $300 per week, Finn started a GoFundMe page to ask for donations, and they have since raised over $84,000!
Find out more about this incredible story in the video below.
COMMENTS POLICY: We have no tolerance for messages of violence, racism, vulgarity, obscenity or other such discourteous behavior. Thank you for contributing to a respectful and useful online dialogue.