Organizations have started worldwide with the aim to teach those suffering from the disease to go into the ocean and surf. One of them is the Mauli Ola (breath of life) Foundation. The organization helps patients by pairing them with professional surfers such as Sunny Garcia and Kelly Slater.
"We have found the silver lining to it all and that has been through surfing," said Paulette Montelone on one summer day as her family was at San Onofre State Beach. Three of her five kids are diagnosed with cystic fibrosis. Not only does surfing help her children, Paulette thinks that it also helps them to do something enjoyable together. "It's helping them breathe better...but it's also helping us, as a family, enjoy something together."
Someone who has cystic fibrosis is said to have an average life span of around 40. However, there are several patients who don't even survive after their teen life. Speculated to be inherited from both the child's parents, the genetic condition has already affected 70,000 patients worldwide.
While no cure has been found yet, doctors in Australia learned about a decade ago that patients who surfed had shown more ease in breathing. The salt water discovery prompted medical research to conduct studies in 2006 by providing patients with saline treatments.
When the Montelone family found the Mauli Ola organization one year after the diagnosis on the children was made, the kids learned to surf and eventually benefited from the activity. Every summer, they would trek from their home at Yorba Linda to the beach for at least once a week and stay for days. The kids' treatments are done on the beach which coincides with their surfing lessons.
"They're spitting up their mucous. I mean I'm out there going, 'Hey, cough it up man. No shame,'" said world champion surfer Josh Baxter who is one of the volunteers at Mauli Ola and regularly joins the Montelones for surfing.
The three siblings, wherein Michael is the oldest, would also have a regular monthly visit to the doctor. Their appointments can even last up to six hours. Michael seems to have the biggest awareness on the implications brought by cystic fibrosis. "I still fear that, like, I'm gonna die or my brother and sister might," said Michael. "I know that could happen but I try to put it in the back of my head so that I can keep moving through all the days."
