Ethan is a 15 year old, high school sophomore in Colorado Springs. He has an enthusiasm for life and his future. He is a competitive bowler because bowling is a sport where his size is not a hindrance, and he strives to excel at it. He is on the high school league, that went to state this year, and bowls in several other leagues also. He enjoys snowboarding, camping, ATVing, and other outdoor activities with his family, and they go as often as financially possible. Many of these activities have been reduced or even stopped due to his need for transplant.

He is infatuated with Star Wars from Episode One to the latest in theaters, collecting every Lego set he can, and watching the behind the scenes of how the movies were made. The University of Tennessee, his “pre-alma mater”, is his sporting passion. He follows the UT Volunteers football and basketball teams, cheering at each win, and feeling every loss. A long term goal he holds is to attend the University of Tennessee, get a degree in business management, and use his schooling to open a Nerf gun battle facility.

Since being diagnosed at 3 months with Cystic Fibrosis, he and his family have faced several
challenges. Having CF, Ethan has diminished growth making him the shortest in his sophomore class, CF related diabetes (CFRD), and was diagnosed with liver disease in 2015. He has a regiment of pills both daily and with every meal. He has breathing treatments and a vibrating vest he does multiple times a day. With the CFRD, he is now on a wireless insulin pump checking his sugar and counting carbs with every meal.

During family dinners, they watch The Food Network shows to enhance his appetite. This spurred his love of shows like Diners Drive-Ins & Dives (DDD), Guy’s Grocery Games (GGG), and a wish to meet Guy Fieri to be on a show. He loves ribs and trying all new locations to rate them. At one point, he even wrote a rib blog of his ratings and their locations across the country. With every trip to see family or just vacation, he is always seeking new DDD locations to try their food and ribs.

Developing liver disease as a complication of CF, Ethan had been treating it medically until it worsened. Christmas Eve of 2017, while visiting family, he was rushed to the East Tennessee Children’s Hospital ER with internal bleeding in his esophagus. Over the next five days in ICU, doctors instructed his parents to see a liver specialist. Upon returning to Colorado Springs, the liver specialist and the transplant team in Denver qualified him to be listed on the UNOS transplant list. The family has explored every option to have this procedure done sooner rather than later, even looking into a living donor. Just recently they have been notified that insurance will approve a live donor, but it is requiring the family to travel 1,400 miles for the transplant. He has a close family member who has offered to be tested as a match, and the family can’t be thankful enough.

Ethan is in anticipation of getting through this procedure and beginning to live the life of a teenager again by learning to drive and resuming his favorite activities of bowling and snowboarding.

The Children’s Organ Transplant Association (COTA) helps children and young adults who need a life-saving transplant by providing fundraising assistance and family support. COTA is the nation’s only fundraising organization solely dedicated to raising life-saving dollars in honor of transplant-needy children and young adults. 100% of each contribution made to COTA in honor of our patients helps meet transplant-related expenses. COTA’s services are free to our families, and gifts to COTA are tax deductible to the fullest extent of the law.