LOGAN – It was like a dream for Caleb Kelley, an eight-year-old Cache Valley boy who loves dinosaurs. On Friday, April 26, Fox Pest Control South headquarters was turned into a giant dinosaur party, where Kelleyl found out his Make-A-Wish was coming true.
Caleb and his family are headed to Disney World in the fall of next year.
“I knew something was up when I got home from school and there was T-rex setting in a jeep in my driveway,” he said. “When I got to the party and saw all the other stuff, I thought this is crazy.”
Kelley was recipient of a Make-a-Wish Jurassic Park party held at the main office of Fox Pest control on Friday.
The boy has had a rough time the past year and a half or so. When Caleb was six years old he was diagnosed with a rare blood disorder, Aplastic Anemia, a bone marrow failure disorder.
The youngster required a bone marrow transplant. In the beginning, the doctors were trying to avoid using his identical twin brother, Jensen, who was a perfect match. They were looking all over the world for a donor and when everything else fell through they ended up using Jensen as a last resort.
“He had a ton of stays in Primary Children’s Hospital,” his mother Megan said. “He was diagnosed in October 2022; he left the hospital in September 2023. “
Caleb had over 200 blood transfusions; he was in and out of Primary’s. Some days he was out of the hospital for 15 days and once it was only for about 14 minutes.
The family moved into an aunt’s house in Salt Lake City to be closer to the hospital.
After spending a great deal of time getting care at the Salt Lake hospital, he finally was well enough to come home.
“There have been so many things that happened,” she said. “Once he went into cardiac arrest in the hospital they had to CPR to bring him back.”
He had no immunity for five months and developed a fungal infection that traveled to his lungs.
“It was bazar how it all worked out,” his mother said. “We ended up having an emergency bone marrow transplant and his brother Jensen was the donor.”
She said if it weren’t for his identical twin brother he may not have made it.
After watching her son get so many blood donations, donating her blood has become important to her. And she became an advocate of donating blood.
“The moment we used Jensen as a donor everything worked out,” she said. “It was a horrible, horrible summer but as it turned out it all worked out.”
She said Caleb is almost back to normal. He has slowed down a little, but he is almost back to his normal self.
“It was so bad and now it feels so good,” she said. “Our social worker came to us and said he was eligible for Make-A Wish.”
By the time they got the Make-A-Wish approved they tried to get him to talk to us about what he would wish for.
“The news came at such a clutch time, the timing it was wild,” she said. “He was having a rough time and talking about a Jurassic adventure distracted him from the pain he was going through.”
Friday, in Logan everything was set up. There were bridges to go over and tunnels to crawl through and fossils to find.
Caleb went to Fox’s south headquarters for a giant dinosaur party, where he found out his wish is coming true.
Providing this wish for Caleb was a huge group effort. Donations from the Fox Pest Control company, employees and their families made the Make-A-Wish experience possible.
Firehouse Pizza donated food for the proclamation event to share their support of this local, amazing family.
Christina Davis, Fox’s Cultural Engagement Specialist, was making sure the event went off without a hitch.
“I love that I work for a company that lives by the values they teach,” she said. “Our yearly Make-A-Wish sponsorship is just one of the many ways Fox gives back to the community. I feel fortunate to be a part of this company and this event!”
Fox has teamed up Make-A-Wish Utah for Cache Valley residents and their children for six years.