Winter is a hard season. But for one 10-year-old soccer player with cystic fibrosis, cold weather is extra difficult, stiffening delicate lung tissue, and making it hard to draw a breath.

So Laura Stevens is thrilled the Children's Wish Foundation is providing her with a indoor training space, right in the basement of her own home.

"I can't practise outside, because of my lungs," says Laura, noting that exercising outside even when it's warm is a problem because allergens in the air irritate her condition, which sees the lungs and gut produce too much mucus to breathe and digest food properly.

This gets frustrating for Laura, who plays club soccer with The Drillers. She has both a competitive spirit and a natural gift for the sport, but her lung capacity has been compromised, and operates at 50 percent of normal.

Laura Stevens has Cystic Fibrosis and the Children's Wish Foundation has granted her a wish to have a special soccer training area installed in her basement, taken on Sunday March 5, 2017 in Edmonton.

According to the Cystic Fibrosis Canada website, CF is the most common fatal genetic disease affecting Canadian children and young adults. There is no cure, only an exhaustive regime of pills and physiotherapy. Every day for Laura starts with 90 minutes of treatment that's repeated several times throughout the day. She takes 50 pills daily, and ends up in hospital a couple of times a year with severe germ attacks and lunch infections.

The whole situation can make Laura angry, at her own body, and at her parents for making her stick to the onerous schedule.

"When you're mad and you have to do physio - hide!" says the Gr. 5 student at Edmonton Academy, joking about how she copes.

Spunky nature notwithstanding, Laura tires easily. It takes all her energy to attack the soccer field (she plays both goal and forward) or to complete a ski run with her family - including brother, Logan, 12, and parents Jonathan and Sandy. Yet exercise is important to keep the lungs healthy as possible, and to provide stress relief.

Thanks to a $7,000 gift from the foundation, which celebrates Children's Wish Month throughout March, Laura has special equipment in her newly-renovated basement. There's a big, springy net for drills, and the floor is covered with artificial turf donated by the Edmonton Minor Soccer Association. A time clock and mini-bleachers are on the way, plus weights, and an aerobic endurance machine.

Already teammates are visiting, excited about indoor soccer in the Stevens' basement.

"It's medically important for her (to exercise)," says dad Jonathan. "But it's also terrifically fun."

lfaulder@postmedia.com

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