VISTA -- Sawyer Sherwood enjoys spending his afternoons swimming in a portable pool with his mother out in the front yard. The 8-year-old boy rarely stays above the surface -- as he loves to swim to the bottom of the 3-feet deep inflatable pool and retrieve toys.

But Sawyer will not be swimming in the pool today because the Make-A-Wish Foundation is sending him and his family to Hawaii.

"He knows we're going and he's excited about swimming," Sawyer's mother Janis Sherwood said Monday. "It's unbelievable that they're doing this for us."

The foundation is sending the family to the Hyatt Regency Maui Resort and Spa for a week because Sawyer has found solace in the water since being diagnosed in April with the rare genetic disease known as adrenoleukodystrophy, more commonly known as ALD.

The disease, which affects only boys and young men, destroys the insulating material, or myelin, in the brain and can lead to a loss of mental and physical functions and can be fatal.

"In the last month, we have seen changes in him on a daily basis," Sherwood said. "He's losing a little more function each day and his vision and hearing are severely impaired."

Sawyer needs help moving around the house to avoid running into walls, but in the water the boy who used to play baseball, basketball and soccer navigates through the water with ease.

"Sawyer's been the happiest in the water," said Sherwood speaking for the boy whose communication is limited. "Swimming has new meaning for him now because he's so restricted in what he's able to do. Being in the water gives him freedom."

It's his new-found love for the water that led the Make-A-Wish foundation, which grants the wishes of children with life-threatening medical conditions, to send the family to the beaches of Maui.

The family will be picked up by a limo this morning, and the foundation is paying for all the travel costs including the food, entertainment and souvenirs.

Sherwood said the family plans to visit the volcanos and waterfalls, but most of the trip will be spent snorkeling, boogie boarding or just swimming in the ocean.

"It's phenomenal what they put together for us in such a short time," said Sherwood. "It's such an enormous gift."

The family learned in May that Sawyer can't get a bone-marrow transplant to cure the genetic disease because it has advanced too far.

"It was like having the door shut in our face as far as a cure was concerned," Sherwood said. "There are no alternative out there now."

The family has not stopped looking for answers, and his mother said Sawyer takes various medical supplements each day and has seen more than 15 doctors in the past couple of months.

Sherwood said she has spent hours on the Internet researching the rare disease, and she plans to soon start a foundation called Fight ALD. The foundation will be designed to inform the public and medical profession about catching the symptoms of the disease before it's too late.

"If the diagnosis had been in a timely manner our future would look very different right now," Sherwood said. "Now the future is unclear."

To help the family raise money to pay for the medical costs, the Stone Brewing Company in San Marcos, where Sawyer's father Bill works, will have 300 cases of a special beer on sale in September with the proceeds going toward Sawyer's fund.

A trust account at U.S. Bank is set up to help cover the family's medical costs.

Contributions to the For the Benefit of Sawyer account No. 153454140101 can be sent or deposited at U.S. Bank, 1385 E. Vista Way, Vista, CA, 92084

Contact David Sterrett at (760) 631-6625 or dsterrett@nctimes.com.