Alicia Bennett:  

Life Hello Everybody! After graduation I attended Modesto Jr. College where I studied accounting but then changed my mind. I then decided I wanted to become a police officer, but again, I changed my mind. I didn't like that school so I moved back home where I got a job at the hospital doing billing. I met John, my husband, at my sister's wedding, but he was in the Marines so I didn't see him again for a couple of years when he was discharged. We dated for 3 years before we were married in 1995. In May, 1996 we had Ciara, I had her with us at the reunion. Hunter was born in 1998 and Tommy in 1999. 2001 wasn't a very good year for us. All 3 of our children were diagnosed with a terminal illness called Sanfilippo Syndrome. Sanfilippo kids usually only live to be 10-13 years old and there is no cure. To learn more about our kids, you can visit our website which is caringbridge.org/ca/bennettboys. There is an experimental procedure called an Umbilical Cord Blood Transplant which had only been done on 2 Sanfilippo kids in the world and we had to fight our insurance company to pay for the transplants for Hunter and Tommy. We cannot do Ciara because her symptoms have progressed too far and it wouldn't benefit her. We filed an appeal with Kaiser and ended up getting one million dollars donated to Duke Medical Center to treat the boys. Unfortunately it took 6 months for us to get the money and in that time, the disease had progressed too much in Hunter and when we returned back to Duke, they wouldn't transplant him. In August of 2002, we went to Duke Univ. Medical Center for Tommy...Expand for more