Dying Son's Birthday Wish: to Receive Mail

Bubby Everson is an 8-year-old boy with a simple birthday dream: to receive mail. He loves getting cards and especially stickers, which he'll play with and "put all over the place," his dad, Thomas Everson, tells Q13 Fox. His parents are asking people to send Bubby mail because the Graham, Wash., boy is in dire health. He has cytomegalovirus, or CMV, which is often harmless—but is considered fatal in Bubby's case. When he will go isn't clear, but he also suffers from ailments including scoliosis, deafness, epilepsy, cerebral palsy, and autism, and endures up to 10 seizures a day. "It's very tough, I love him to death and I wouldn't change him but knowing that [I] could lose him at any time—that's hard," says his mom, Brandi McNerney-Everson.

So his parents have started a GoFundMe page to help pay for a sensory room for Bubby. They've also mounted a Facebook campaign to solicit mail. "We have to treat every day like it is the most important day ever," Thomas tells KING-TV. And mail is coming in, including two full boxes in one day from states as diverse as California, Michigan, Florida, and Hawaii. "It has restored my faith in humanity," Brandi tells the Washington Post. "It makes me feel better knowing that people care." The mail also helps Bubby's parents do something for him without holding a birthday party, where he might get sick. "He's happy and loving, and he's caring and he's a fighter," says Brandi. "I don't think he'd be here if he wasn't a fighter." Get their address from any of the above sources. (Or read about a sick boy's father who wants anti-vaxxers banned from the child's school.)