Mandy Shaff, Volunteer Host for Western Wishes, has been taking Concho Valley children and teens to the San Angelo Stockshow and Rodeo for several years. There were two recipients for 2022.
Mandy describes each recipient below:
Tori Colomo is our first wish recipient for the 2022 San Angelo rodeo. She is a young adult with several different disabilities. First and foremost, she is legally blind, but that does not stop her from anything at all. Tori has skied, rock-climbed and zip-lined and will try anything once. She attended the Texas School for the Blind. Tori also has cerebral palsy on her left side, an intellectual disorder and a seizure disorder. The doctors suspect that Tori had a stroke in the womb before she was born. Despite all these challenges, Tori is very outgoing and social and loves people and animals. Her most favorite of all is horses and she has been riding at Sonrisa’s Equine Therapy in San Angelo for a few years now. She was nominated by Megan Kirkwood of Sonrisa’s for this wish. I’m very excited to meet this fearless young lady and happy to be hosting her at this year’s San Angelo rodeo.
Khloe Salazar is our second wish kid for the 2022 San Angelo rodeo. She is 6-years-old and in kindergarten. At 4-years-old she was diagnosed with Juvenile Huntington’s Disease. She is one of the youngest kids in the United States to be diagnosed with this neurodegenerative disease. It is terminal and because she developed it at such a young age, doctors have given her 6-8 years to live and those years will not be easy. Khloe is doing pretty good right now, but she will get progressively worse as the years go by. Her mom described Juvenile Huntington’s Disease as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and ALS all rolled into one. Her parents first noticed a problem when she went back to crawling instead of walking and she started struggling with balance. Her speech has always been a bit of an issue as well and she is currently in speech therapy along with physical therapy. But her favorite therapy is the equine therapy she receives at Sonrisa’s in San Angelo. Despite these tragic circumstances, Khloe is always smiling and is happy. Obviously, she loves horses and other little girl activities like playing outside, swinging, dressing up and chasing her little sister around. She also used to take gymnastics before she had to quit. Khloe was nominated by Megan Kirkwood at Sonrisa’s Equine Therapy. This is definitely a heart-breaking situation for sure, so I am very happy to be hosting her and her family at the San Angelo rodeo.
