Brave Young Leukemia Survivor Will Get to Meet Blake Shelton
A young boy who was battling a terminal illness will get to meet the country star whose music helped him through those trying times, WQAD reports.
Eight-year-old Sammy Hodgett, a passionate Blake Shelton fan from Tampico, Ill., will get to meet Shelton when he makes a stop at the TaxSlayer Center in Moline, Ill., in February. Hodgett was diagnosed with T-Cell Lymphoblastic Leukemia in 2014 and following a reaction to his chemotherapy treatment, he was put in a medically induced coma for six weeks.
"We actually lost him twice, they had to do like even epinephrine in his heart, it was insane," his mother Becky Hodgett tells WQAD.
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It was Shelton's music that helped get his young fan through the difficult obstacles, as his family would play his songs while he was in the coma -- particularly his favorite tune, "Boys 'Round Here."
"When he would actually be like, 'I recognize that song', it just is overwhelming," Hodgett says.
Shelton and his team caught sight of his mom's Facebook campaign for little Sammy to meet his favorite singer when he's in town, and Shelton is making that dream come true. His publicist sent a letter to Sammy and his family, inviting him to be his special guest during his show at the TaxSlayer Center.
"It's crazy, I just can't even believe it and you know, he's this big star and you feel like they don't always have time to look at that type of thing," Becky says in reaction to the letter. Sammy, who's overcome his battle with leukemia that forced him to learn to walk, talk and eat again, can be seen singing along to the music video of Shelton's "Every Time I Hear That Song" after reading the exciting letter. Check that out at WQAD's website.
Shelton's appearance at the TaxSlayer Center on Feb. 23 is just one of many stops on his 2018 Country Music Freaks Tour with Trace Adkins, Carly Pearce and Brett Eldredge.
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