Video: Fulton Family In Competition For Handicapped Accessible Van

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FULTON, MISS. (WCBI) – A North Mississippi family is starting a social media campaign for a chance to win a handicapped accessible van.

As WCBI’s Allie Martin reports, the van would mean a huge difference to the young family with a five year old with a rare disease who keeps beating the odds.

Whenever this family travels, it takes a lot of time to get on the road. Parents Nick and Alisha Kent, along with their oldest child, Kylee, work together to get Eli from his bed to the van.

“I carry him, his dad carries his life support, suction and all the machines, we lay him in the floor of the van,” Kent said.

At eight weeks-old, Eli started having trouble breathing. He’s on a ventilator and is paralyzed from the neck down after being diagnosed with Spinal Muscular Atrophy with Respiratory Distress, or SPARD.

Eli’s wheelchair won’t fit in the family’s van.

Now, a contest by the National Mobility Equipment Dealers Association that is giving the family hope for the future.

Basically, you go to a website type in Eli’s name and can vote for him everyday.

At the end of May, the contest ends and the person with the most votes will win a new van.

“We’re kind of limited because we have to get him out, put him in his chair, get him out of his chair, put back in chair, that kind of thing, swapping back and forth. If we could just roll him in and roll him out, he could go a lot of places,” she said.

Most days, Eli stays is in this room watching TV from his bed.

His parents say a handicapped accessible van would let him go to restaurants, parks and other places most of us take for granted.

Eli is a fighter. Doctors said he wouldn’t see his second birthday, but he’s proven them wrong.

Now, his parents are using that fighting spirit to ignite a social media firestorm for the competition.

“Vote, vote, share, share, tell everybody you see , vote for Eli,” she said.

For information on how to go vote, go to www.mobilityawarenessmonth.com/entrant/eli-kent-tupelo-ms/