FORT MILL—Donna Jean Hatch-Sherlock is an active member at St. Philip Neri, cooks meals for Oratorian priests, and even finds time to enroll in graduate-level courses “for fun.”
On the surface, it’s a normal list of activities for the average busy person. But Hatch-Sherlock goes about her routine while also battling a degenerative form of multiple sclerosis.
“I have good days and bad days just like everyone else,” Hatch-Sherlock said this week. “Right now, there have been days where I haven’t been doing very well.”
Hatch-Sherlock, 63, who goes by her initials “DJ,” has become a fixture not only at her parish, but throughout the entire Rock Hill Oratory, in spite of her debilitating condition.
“DJ is a perfect example of a layperson who gives herself tirelessly to the Church and the community,” said Oratorian Father Agustin Guzman, pastor at All Saints Church in Lake Wylie. He met Hatch-Sherlock when she was part of a women’s group that prayed for the Oratorian priests.
“Her spirit, her faith and her efforts have been remarkable, with everything she’s gone through,” he said.
On top of the numbness, extreme fatigue and pain associated with her condition, Hatch-Sherlock is also overcoming the lingering effects of one of the worst cold and flu seasons to hit the state. She said her faith in God allows her to persevere.
“God has a reason for everything,” she said. “I don’t know why I’m having to go through this experience. But God does, and I believe one day I will know why.”
Hatch-Sherlock has dealt with MS since 1990, when she was living in Boston. She received the diagnosis shortly after her first husband died of pancreatic cancer.
“God helped me move on from that,” Hatch-Sherlock said. “I met and remarried a wonderful man and we moved (to the Rock Hill area) in 1998. He’s been so wonderfully supportive through all of this.”
Hatch-Sherlock also draws strength from the support of parishioners at St. Philip Neri and her friends at the Oratory.
“What a wonderful group they are,” Hatch-Sherlock said. “I don’t know where we would be today without them.”
She recently learned of an experimental clinical trial specific to her condition that would suppress, if not eradicate, the disease.
“It’s a stem cell procedure,” said Hatch-Sherlock, who has a master’s degree in nursing. “Basically, they take out the (diseased) stem cells and they clean out your immune system, almost like a purification. Then they transplant the stem cells so the immune system can rebuild itself.”
If successful, the immune system will be free of any infected stem cells and, in effect, would reverse the disease’s conditions.
Through her research, Hatch- Sherlock has come across one such procedure on the East Coast, but it is expensive. By her most conservative estimates, it would cost around $15,000. Even with insurance coverage, the expenses would run the gamut, including the stem cell transplant, an extra unit of stem cells, rehabilitation, and physical therapy, not to mention the co-pays, lab fees, and other miscellaneous costs.
Parishioners at St. Philip Neri and staff members at the Oratory have stepped in and started awareness and fundraising campaigns to help Hatch-Sherlock, who they describe as someone who has done so much to help others.
“I think it’s important that everyone is aware of someone who has shown excellent discipleship,” Father Guzman said. “This is a person who goes out of her way to take care of people and put everyone else’s needs ahead of her own. And we need to do what we can to help her in the same way that she’s helped so many of us.”
By Chip Lupo / Special to The Miscellany
