Downers Grove Magazine | Spotlight
ABOVE PHOTOGRAPH BY TANGIE SHEETS, PHOTO ON THE RIGHT BY KAREN KARDATZKE
Noah’s Hope Despite losing two of their own children, Downers Grove parents Jennifer and Tracy VanHoutan have saved the lives of countless others BY KERRIE KENNEDY
D
owners Grove residents Jennifer and Tracy VanHoutan have experienced the unimaginable: in the past three years, they have lost two of their four children.
Their son Noah died in March 2016 at the age of 11, and their daughter Laine passed away two years later in March 2018 at the age of 12. Their children succumbed to a rare 30
but devastating disease called CLN2 Batten disease. “Jen and I were both unknowingly carriers of this condition, and each of our children had a 1 in 4 chance of being affected,” Tracy VanHoutan said. “The symptoms don’t present until the age of 3 or 4, when [the affected children] start having seizures and language delays. Eventually, they lose their vision, their speech and their ability to walk and eat by mouth. An easy way to explain it
DOWNERS GROVE MAGAZINE
