Jemison softball wears pink to honor JHS student
Published 11:33 am Monday, March 15, 2021
- Jemison’s Rilee Martin and Brooke Smith show off their pink attire before the team’s game against Isabella on March 13. The team wore pink in the county softball tournament to honor JHS student Matthew Skelton, who was diagnosed with cancer. (ZACHARY SEIFTER/ ADVERTISER)
|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
By Zachary Seifter/ Staff Writer
The Jemison High School softball team wore pink socks and pink hair bows in the Chilton County softball tournament on March 12 and 13 to honor JHS student Matthew Skelton.
Skelton is 15 years old and was recently diagnosed with epithelioid sarcoma, a rare type of soft tissue cancer.
The JHS softball team chose to wear pink because it is Skelton’s favorite color. They were not the only ones though to wear it in support of Skelton.
“We have personal friends that have had cancer … so we know how it is and how it feels to have the support with friends, family and your whole school,” JHS softball player Rilee Martin said. “They asked him what his favorite color was and he said pink, so Friday [March 12], including us, the whole school wore pink … to let him know that we are here for him to support him through this whole journey.”
The support for Skelton goes beyond the school wearing pink. Recently, a fundraising GoFundMe page was started by Timothy Mattie for Skelton. In it there is a picture of Skelton, as well as this message from Mattie:
“This young man’s name is Matthew Skelton. We adopted him into our family about a year and a half ago. He is 15 years old and has recently been diagnosed with epithelioid sarcoma, a rare type of aggressive cancer. We are asking for any donations to help him through this hard time, but most importantly we ask for you to keep him in your thoughts, and prayers. It hurts to see him going through this situation in his life because he is such a nice and gentle young man and he has already been through so much in his life. We would like to say Thank-you to anyone that has taken time to read this far, anything helps from donations to prayers and we ask that you please share this to your friends and family, and have a blessed day goodbye.
The goal for the GoFundMe page was $2,500, a goal that has already been broken as $2,638 has been donated for Skelton.
To help his cause, one can go to https://uk.gofundme.com/f/help-matthew-on-his-journey-through-cancer to donate to Mattie’s GoFundMe page for Skelton.
