{"id":121845,"date":"2025-09-05T13:14:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-05T13:14:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/121845\/"},"modified":"2025-09-05T13:14:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-05T13:14:09","slug":"after-scary-diagnosis-this-junior-golfer-found-inspiration-in-helping-others","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/121845\/","title":{"rendered":"After scary diagnosis, this junior golfer found inspiration in helping others"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two summers ago, Liam Lodding, then 14, was on his way to an American Junior Golf Association tournament in Robinson, Ill., about fours hours south of Chicago, when something didn\u2019t feel right.<\/p>\n

His stomach was bothering him, but he had been looking forward to the event and wanted to play, so he powered through, despite increasing pain throughout the round.<\/p>\n

Overnight, the discomfort worsened and Liam woke up the next day to chest pain so severe he felt like he couldn\u2019t breathe. Liam\u2019s mother, Stephanie, rushed him to the hospital, where bloodwork revealed Liam\u2019s level of troponin \u2014 a protein found in the heart muscle \u2014 was exceedingly high, which can be indicative of a heart attack. Liam was transported via helicopter to UI Health in Chicago, where he stayed for a week. He was diagnosed with myocarditis, or inflammation of the heart muscle.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t know if I was going to have to have a heart transplant,\u201d Liam said the other day. \u201cDoctors didn\u2019t know exactly what was going on.\u201d<\/p>\n

Liam went on to make a full recovery, but his experience in the hospital changed his life.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had a really bad thing happen to me, but I was seeing kids who have, like, stage 4 cancer and diseases that are way, way worse than mine,\u201d Liam said. \u201cI was just really inspired to do something.\u201d<\/p>\n

Facing a months-long break from golf after his hospital discharge, Liam decided to focus his efforts on giving back. He learned of the\u00a0AJGA\u2019s Leadership Links program<\/a>, which assists AJGA players with their fundraising efforts by providing them a personalized website and marketing materials, processing donations and issuing tax letters.<\/p>\n

Liam turned his attention to the Jack Nicklaus Children\u2019s Healthcare Foundation and started soliciting donations.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took me a couple weeks to raise $5,000, and then I really just wanted to keep going more and more,\u201d he said. \u201cI just started emailing and calling people, and I was just asking for anyone who can donate, because my thing is, any little thing counts. No matter if you get $5, you get $1, anything counts.\u201d<\/p>\n

Liam raised $40,000 in a year.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was blown away,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

In March, Liam joined up with other charity-minded juniors to present a check to Jack Nicklaus in person, an experience he described as \u201cunreal.\u201d This year, Liam set his fundraising sights even higher, with a goal of $77,777. He\u2019s about halfway there, but is hopeful an upcoming charity tournament he\u2019s hosting at his home golf club, Elgin Country Club<\/a> in Illinois, will bring him closer.<\/p>\n

\"Liam
\n Liam on a recent visit with Jack Nicklaus.<\/p>\n

Courtesy AJGA\/USGA<\/p>\n

Despite the upheaval his diagnosis caused in his life, Liam says his illness also brought him new appreciation for things he used to take for granted \u2014 like walking a round of golf. Given his condition, Liam was allowed to use a cart for his high school state championship, where he finished second. Now, he\u2019s free to play and work out without restrictions, but plans to monitor his heart with annual check-ups.<\/p>\n

Earlier this summer, Liam received word that he had been named the male recipient of the 2025 USGA-AJGA Presidents\u2019 Leadership Award, which was established in 2005 to identify one male and one female junior golfer who demonstrate leadership, character and community service through their involvement with the Leadership Links program \u2014 a joint initiative founded by the USGA and AJGA to further develop junior golfers through volunteerism and philanthropy.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not a very emotional person,\u201d Liam said of receiving the award, \u201cbut I shed a little tear there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Liam is entering his senior year at Harvest Christian Academy in Elgin, Ill., and with college looming, he says he\u2019s certain of two things: golf will continue to play a role in his life \u2014 and philanthropy will, too.<\/p>\n

\u201cI definitely want to stick with the golf path,\u201d he said. \u201cMy dreams are to play professional golf, but at the end of the day, before this even happened, I used to be so golf, golf, golf, everything was golf. My identity, how I thought of myself, is how I play on the golf course.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter that, I was like, there\u2019s so many bigger things to life than just a golf shot and going out to shoot a golf score. It just helped me be so much more grateful for the experiences that I\u2019m having right now.\u201d<\/p>\n

That\u2019s not to say Liam isn\u2019t also looking forward.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just want to keep going and just keep building off what I have now for the rest of my life,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two summers ago, Liam Lodding, then 14, was on his way to an American Junior Golf Association tournament…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":121846,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[443],"tags":[49,48,622,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-121845","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-golf","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-golf","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121845","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=121845"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121845\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/121846"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=121845"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=121845"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=121845"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}