Sick girl gets wish to build wardrobe

LISA QUEEN

August 21, 2008

Like any little girl, seven-year-old Elena likes to wear fancy clothes.

Today, the North York girl gets a chance to build a new wardrobe when she goes on a shopping spree, thanks to Make-a-Wish Canada's Toronto and central Ontario chapter.

The agency grants wishes to children with life-threatening illnesses.

Elena has sickle cell disease, a hereditary blood disorder that causes red blood cells to take on a rigid and sickle, or crescent, shape.

The abnormal cells have difficulty moving through the blood vessels, depriving tissues of oxygen.

The potentially fatal disease can cut the life-expectancy of its victims in half. Patients also suffer from periodic painful attacks and other health complications.

The youngest of three girls, Elena is usually healthy, although her disease began to worsen about the age of four or five, said her mother Lofts Lipo.

She has to take precautions to remain well such as saving her strength, going to bed early, eating well and bundling up well in the cold.

Even then, a couple of times a year, Elena needs to be hospitalized, where she is given morphine to manage the pain.

"She is going to grow up, there is no problem with that but the problem is she has to take care of herself," said Lipo, whose eldest daughter also has the disease and whose middle daughter is a carrier.

"She has to eat well and sleep well or the crisis comes on unpredictably. She plays with her friends. She does everything. It is just exercise, it's not a good thing for her or she gets sick and ends up in hospital."

Being ill was the last thing on Elena's mind as she contemplated riding in a chauffeur-driven limousine and then hitting the stores at Vaughan Mills mall for her shopping spree.

Her focus is clothing stores in search of pretty dresses, skirts and tops, although she also is looking to replenish her art supplies.

"I want to have new clothes for school," said the St. Philip Neri Catholic School Grade 3 student, who, although she wears a uniform, wants to wear her new wardrobe on dress-down days and to church.

"I like to paint. I like to find websites on the computer for games."

Elena, who also enjoys writing poetry, hopes to be a well-dressed doctor or artist when she grows up.

Lipo said her daughter has been looking forward to the shopping spree.

"She is pretty excited," she said, praising Make-a-Wish for putting a big smile on Elena's face.