John Tacket and Ashley Hagi

John Tacket and Ashley Hagi playing together (Film Incredible Medical Mysteries: Growing Up Old)

John Tacket and Ashley Hagi were Progeria sufferers. Progeria is an "extremely rare genetic disease of childhood and is estimated to affect one in 8 million newborns worldwide."

This was when they first met (Film Incredible Medical Mysteries: Growing Up Old)

John Tacket was born 3 weeks premature to a musician couple Lynn and Troy Tacket in Michigan. He was 6.5 pounds in weight and looked healthy. Three years after that, Lori Hagi in Western Canada gave a birth to her daughter, Ashley Hagi. Ashley was cute, lively, and healthy. Nobody would ever think there was something wrong with either John or Ashley.

One day on a family vacation, they first met and became friends, very close friends, like peanut butter and jelly. They might have known that they had a similarity. Until here, everything was still normal.

Look at her head. She was bald since her childhood (Film Incredible Medical Mysteries: Growing Up Old)

The Tackets knew there was something wrong with John after his first year. His pediatrician said that John did not grow normally; he stopped growing. Finally his parents brought him to University of Michigan and after some tests the doctors could not find anything wrong, so they accused John’s parents for not feeding him properly.

So did Ashley. She showed the same symptoms as John did. Additionally, her hair, which was black at first, was becoming less than before and blonde. After that, she had no hair at all.

John playing drum and billiard (Film Incredible Medical Mysteries: Growing Up Old)

It turned out that both John and Ashley suffered from Progeria. Their bodies were like bodies of aged people. In her age of eleven, Ashley was 21 pounds and barely 3 feet tall. With no fat in the body, baldness, a pinched nose, a small face and blood vessels standing out; Ashley, John, and any other Progeria sufferers are much more alike with one another, more than with their original parents. They will not have their adult teeth as well as their puberties. The good news is that Progeria sufferers have normal intellect, personality, and brain.

On John’s first time studying at school, he faced a very difficult situation. He wore a cap which was always taken off by some naughty students. However, with his kind personality, he became popular at school. He became involved in some school activities such as billiard club, football games and marching band. He also won a match with his remote control car. His dream was to be a rock star and play on the stage in front of people. To make it come true, he had to graduate from school and join the audition to form a band. But if he could not make it, he wanted to be a studio musician.

Meanwhile, Ashley had been ageing about 7 years for every year of her life. That made her body at that time closer to 70 years old. But instead of her physical appearance, Ashley was easily accepted by her friends because of her hospitality.

John and Ashley met at least every another year. They were best friends. Their friendship was so close that they understood each other. You know, when someone knows well how you feel because he faces the same thing as you do.

Being Progeria sufferers, Ashley and John had to experienced pain in their chests, blockages of blood vessels, even strokes as something customary. Not considering their dark destinies, Ashley and John demonstrated a high enthusiasm for their lives.

John Tacket (Film Incredible Medical Mysteries: Growing Up Old)

At my first time watching the film “Incredible Medical Mysteries: Growing Up Old” (this is the film about Progeria, from which I know about John Tacket and Ashley Hagi), I was about to think that this would be a boring film. I thought I would see people suffering from Progeria with sadness, desperation, and full of pity for themselves. But how shocked I was to find that John and Ashley were 180 degrees different from what I had been thinking about. They were full of spirit, happy, and had positive thinking. They accepted themselves as they were. I did not see any regret from them for being Progeria sufferers. Like John, he could still join a billiard club and marching band; he even had a dream to be a musician. On the other hand, many teenagers do not really know what they want to be (including me), whereas in fact they have chances to have their long and bright futures.

Besides that, I found that both John’s and Ashley’s families were happy. Having a child who suffered from Progeria was not easy at all. But their families accepted and loved them as if they were normal kids. If you compare their families with normal families, you can see the differences. Normal families sometimes have their own problems. Some families are broken homes, full of quarrelling and abuse, or having children using drugs. But the Tackets and Hagis lived in harmony, happily ever after…

On March 3, 2004 John Tacket passed away. I believe during his short life, he had brought happiness to his family and friends...

From: Incredible Medical Mysteries: Growing Up Old and www.genome.gov