AMARILLO, Texas (KAMR/KCIT) — For Lindsey Kinard, Director of the Children’s Miracle Network Amarillo Chapter, the mission is personal.
“I have a little boy, his name is Brecken, he’s 10. He was born with a congenital abnormality of his intestines,” Kinard said. “At three months old, he had emergency surgery and we spent a month in PEDI ICU.”
A few years later, another health issue popped up.
“When he was three, he was diagnosed with an illness called scalded staff skin syndrome,” she continued. “That’s when we realized he has some immune system issues.” Brecken is a trooper, and keeps pushing in spite of plenty treatments.
“I do breathing treatments,” he told us. “I have asthma, I do bloodwork a lot.”
Those experiences helped Kinard get a front seat perspective of what CMN families deal with.
“I know first hand what it’s like to talk to those families that find themselves in a crisis situation that they’re not expecting or maybe they can’t afford,” she emphasized.
Every one them, feeding right in to the network’s purpose.
“Our mission is to improve the quality of healthcare for children here in the Texas Panhandle,” she told KAMR.
In addition to the Panhandle, CMN serves a few counties in Oklahoma, New Mexico and one county in Kansas.
“We help anyone. People who have insurance, people that do not have insurance, we help middle class families, we help families that fall below that,” Kinard added.
To do all of this, non-profits like CMN need donations, and plenty of them.
“All the funds that CMN raises stays in the area. CMN is a national non-profit, but we’re a local chapter of that, and all funds stay local,” she noted.
As for her son Brecken, he’s doing alright.
“There’s a lot of kids, and they can be my friends,” he said.
The ability to help other families, “to be able to just be a ray of light, is a blessing that has affected my life, “Kinard emphasized. So, I know first hand, how it can impact the families we serve.”
Up next for CMN is the Homerun Derby on Friday, May 13th. For more information, click here.
