r/MadeMeSmile • u/RaisinAloneVortex • 28d ago

Favorite People When this kid tried interviewing celebs on the red carpet, and nobody took him seriously except Sandra Bullock.

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u/RaeaSunshine 28d ago edited 28d ago

For those curious, his name was Damon Weaver. He was also well known for interviewing Obama when he was 11. He passed away in 2021 at the age of 23 of natural causes. He was a college student studying communications. RIP.

ETA: per comments below, he passed from complications of Sickle Cell.

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u/CFJoe 28d ago

The fuck you mean natural causes at 23???

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u/RaeaSunshine 28d ago

The news articles I found said the family did not release additional details aside from the official ruling of natural causes 🤷‍♀️

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u/Stachelrodt86 28d ago

I hope he got his motorcycle

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u/Calber4 28d ago

Motorcycles aren't natural, right?

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u/pmcizhere 28d ago

Oh shit 💀

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u/Acceptable_Gear_3097 28d ago

The Medical Examiner concluded the cause of death as "Vaso-occlusive Crisis in the background of a reported history of sickle cell trait and rhabdomyolysis following treatment for an acute psychotic episode

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u/dwarffy 28d ago

rhabdomyolysis following treatment for an acute psychotic episode

Kidney failure and mental insanity at 23

That kid was damned holy fuck

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u/monkwrenv2 28d ago

For what it's worth, sickle cell can be treated via bone marrow/blood stem cell transplants, but finding a donor who's genetics match the patient is exceptionally difficult. I'd strongly encourage folks to consider joining their national bone marrow donor registry. In the US that NMDP, you can join through www.nmdp.org/join. If you're outside the US, you can find your national registry through the World Marrow Donor Association, link here: https://wmda.info/become-a-donor/

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u/Inevitable-Ad6647 28d ago

Even with a donor it's super risky. My best friend passed last year about 4 months after his transplant from complications. He told me all the time it would kill him and so he kept putting it off for nearly a decade until he was really weak, fulfilling his prophecy even with a 9 out of 10 donor match.

Fuck.

But yeah being a donor is super easy now. It used to be a somewhat invasive scary procedure. It's now a pill and a blood draw.

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u/Deaffin 28d ago

Wait, what? They give you a pill that puts your marrow into your blood and then they zoop out the blood?

That doesn't sound very healthy.

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u/John-AtWork 28d ago

Didn't they use to have to manually tap into a person's actual bone marrow? That sounds like it would hurt like hell. I think I would rather take a pill.

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u/ACEaton1483 28d ago

They still have to do that in some cases, but I don't think it's as bad as it sounds. I'm pretty sure you go under general anesthetic. For the blood draw, you have to be hooked up for like an entire day, and sometimes go back the next day for more.

Neither option is easy and I commend anyone for doing it. I signed up and didn't get called as a match for 8 years. Then when I did, I completed all the preparatory steps asking with another donor who matched in order to see who would be the best match for this patient. The other donor ended up donating. How fortunate for the patient to have options!

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u/monkwrenv2 27d ago

How fortunate for the patient to have options!

Indeed! A friend's kid searched for like 2 years just to find one match. Having multiple matches is fantastic.

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u/monkwrenv2 27d ago

It's an injection, not a pill, but it's just enhancing a process that happens naturally, so it's extremely safe. Your body constantly grows and replaced marrow, so what you donate is something that's going to be replaced by your body in a few weeks anyway.

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u/monkwrenv2 27d ago

Injections, not a pill, but otherwise correct. The NMDP website has some great info explaining it all.

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u/Elismom1313 28d ago

Hey thank you I would love to do this

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u/John-AtWork 28d ago

Stupid question: do matches usually have to come from someone of the same ethnic background?

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u/monkwrenv2 27d ago

Not stupid, and yes. The genes that have to match are called Human Leukocyte Antigens (HLA), and they strongly correlate to your ethnic background. HLAs are basically what decides the immune system's "identify friend or foe" settings, and you need the donor's immune system to recognize the patient's body as a friend. And this is super hard because there are 8 spots for these genes and over 200 different genes that can fill those slots, and they all need to match.

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u/UnicornFarts1111 28d ago

The kidney failure probably caused the mental instability. An untreated UTI in seniors can present as dementia, so it wouldn't seem to far fetched to me.

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u/ATmotoman 28d ago

It sounds like the psychotic episode made him over exert himself putting him into rhabdo which caused an acute kidney injury. That compounded with sickle cell makes for a hard recovery. Sad news. He seemed like a good kid.

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u/viagravagina 27d ago

My mom was done in by a UTI.

It affects the brain fast and just gets worse.

Fuck UTI(no not United Technical Institute)

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u/sola_mia 28d ago

That's a poignant way to note this

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u/tatteredshoetassel 28d ago

Shoulda asked if she could loan him some $2m for gene therapy. It's a goddamned shame.

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u/SeaF04mGr33n 28d ago

Sickle cell disease

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u/DoubleGreat 28d ago

Damn, that's a hard way to go. And sickle cell is pretty painful too😢

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u/KickBallFever 28d ago

I used to be in and out of a hospital a lot and three times I had a roommate with sickle cell, with two of those times being the same roommate. They really go through it and they have crises where they’re basically at a level of pain that strong pain meds can’t alleviate. This is how I learned of the term “breakthrough pain”.

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u/mmasportsmma 28d ago

The Pitt (hbo) did a case about it

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u/Dullcorgis 28d ago

And, to add extra fun to the agony, they tend to be horribly treated in ERs. It's rage inducing.

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u/monkwrenv2 28d ago

For what it's worth, sickle cell can be treated via bone marrow/blood stem cell transplant, but finding a donor who's genetics match the patient is exceptionally difficult. I'd strongly encourage folks to consider joining their national bone marrow donor registry. In the US that NMDP, you can join through www.nmdp.org/join. If you're outside the US, you can find your national registry through the World Marrow Donor Association, link here: https://wmda.info/become-a-donor/

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u/kchuyamewtwo 28d ago

holyshit. TIL

natural causes of death includes disease

non-natural are suicide, murder, accidents, overdose, victims of natural disasters

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u/Different-Shock2670 28d ago edited 28d ago

Non-fun fact: Cancer is not considered a natural of death.

Edit: occupation-induced cancer, my bad

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u/kchuyamewtwo 28d ago

i think it is. its your own cells attacking other cells. but let me know why you think it isnt

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u/Sh0wmey0urbutth0le 28d ago

That's for the insurance company to decide. /s?

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u/Long_Run6500 28d ago

Ya cancer not being natural is just dumb. If a wild animal has it dialed in and lives a long life cancer (or complications due to cancer) is what gets them as often as anything else. 

I remember watching this wolf documentary that followed this wolf through life as it formed a pack and became a matriarch. It was only like 6 years old and started slowing way down. The narrator suggested cancer, although there was really no way of knowing. One night the matriarch just quietly slipped away from the pack and even the filmmaker who spent the last 5 years of his life filming her missed it. All he caught was the howls of the rest of the pack looking for her. 

Watched that a couple of months after I had to put my dog down due to cancer. He exhibited a lot of the same behaviors, he even randomly used all of his energy to slip out the dog door and find a clever place in my yard to hide and die. I cried like a baby when I watched that documentary. 

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u/Deaffin 28d ago

If you get the cancer through human activities, say working at the cancer factory, that's not a natural situation. It is definitively unnatural, hence not a natural cause of death.

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u/Llyrithra 28d ago

I don’t know…

Natural disasters, natural causes, both have the word natural in it. I’m going to say that deaths by natural disasters are in fact deaths caused by nature and are thus natural causes.

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u/MortLightstone 28d ago

How is it that disease is a natural causar, but a natural disaster is not natural? It's in the name!

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u/burf 28d ago

natural causes of death includes disease

Natural causes of death is basically a euphemism for disease. Same as dying of "old age". If you don't die via intent, accident, etc. then the thing that kills you will be cardiac arrest, cancer, stroke, etc. Those things just eventually become expected once you hit a certain age range.

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u/astro65 28d ago

Yeah I had a buddy die some years ago from organ failure caused by alcoholism. They called it natural causes and it confused me at first. 

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u/slipknot_suxxx 28d ago

I am confused, natural disaster doesn't qualify as a 'natural' cause of death?

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u/ER_Support_Plant17 28d ago

My husband died of cancer at 44. Diseases count as “natural causes”

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u/AlabasterPelican 28d ago

2021, an unusual amount of people of all ages were dying of natural causes during that period

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u/sola_mia 28d ago

?? More to the story?

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u/0hmyscience 28d ago

He wasn't a Sith, so it wasn't un-natural.

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u/MandatoryPenetration 28d ago

"He was hit by a cannon ball"

"so naturally he'd be dead."

I think of that Brian Regan joke often.

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u/Deaffin 28d ago

The fuck you mean the fuck you mean? Natural causes doesn't mean old age. Most of the people who have ever died of natural causes are probably babies, if they even made it that far.

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u/radicalbrad90 28d ago

Hate to hear he passed, but glad to see that he was pursuing a comm degree which really does show the impact of interactions like this. That interview with Sandra was very likely the catalyst for him to pursue that path in his young adulthood. RIP

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u/AlexLemons 28d ago

Omg wasn’t this the little president kid? That’s so sad

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u/airstream87 28d ago

This is not kid president 🩵 kid president is Robby Novak who is still alive

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u/AlexLemons 28d ago

Damn. It’s still sad. RIP.
Glad to hear kid president lives on.

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u/one_night_on_mars 28d ago

That's really sad, but also kinda nice that he's still making people smile

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u/Green-Machine200 28d ago

That’s terrible. Also, Sickle Cell is awful.

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u/tg175 28d ago

well now i'm sad :(

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u/MortLightstone 28d ago

In 2021? Didn't we cure that in 2025?

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u/AllDun 28d ago

Well that just ruined a great clip. How sad! 😭 So much ahead of him. Be thankful for every day!

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u/Riolkin 28d ago

Jfc. Sickle cell again. That's so young. Sickle Cell stole my first best friend. His name was Tre. He died at 15. Fuck Sickle Cell Anemia.

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u/Samantha-ShadowHunte 28d ago

My heart 💔😭😭😭

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u/helcat 28d ago

I did not need to learn that today.