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About Tatum
Like most little girls, Tatum Blackwell likes chocolate, Scooby Doo, driving her jeep, camping, everything Disney, her friends, and her cousins.
Unlike most little girls, Tatum was born with Recessive Dystrophic Epidermolysis Bullosa (RDEB) - a rare condition in which the skin and mucosal lining of the body (such as the oesophagus) blisters or tears at the slightest knock or rub. As the skin heals, it almost always scars.
Tatum might lose mobility in her hands and feet. She is also at high risk for metastatic squamous cell carcinoma, a skin cancer that is the most common cause of death for people with RDEB, usually between the ages of 15 and 35.
Tatum's condition is genetic; therefore, it will never get better. So we take our days one at a time, preventing blisters or trying our best to quickly heal them, which includes nightly bandage changes to both of Tatum's feet.
But even walking with blisters on both feet every day and feeling pain with every step, Tatum still smiles, laughs, dances, and plays because, first and foremost, Tatum is a happy-go-lucky four-year-old girl who teaches everyone around her that strength comes in all sizes.
For more information about RDEB, visit www.debracanada.org.
 | | To donate to The Tatum Blackwell Fund (project #2296), call The Masonic Foundation at 519-631-0740. Tax receipts are available upon request.
Buy a Notes & Hopes CD and help raise money for RDEB research.
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