Teen Kicked Off Tracy High Football Team For Missing Practice To Care For Sick Mom

TRACY (CBS13) - A mother says her sickness got her son kicked off the Tracy High School football team because he took her to doctor's appointments and missed practice.

"I'm my son's biggest champion, and right now I should be focusing on me, but I can't," said Jaime Westfall.

She is going into surgery Tuesday to remove a 25-pound tumor doctors just discovered inside of her.

But what's weighing on Jaime right now is her son. She says his football coach cut him for unexcused absences.

Austin Westfall didn't call his coach about missing practices when he took his mom to emergency doctor appointments.

"To miss practice to go help my mom? Yeah, that's a perfectly reasonable excuse. If it was their mom or their kids, I know they'd miss practice to be with them," said Austin.

Austin said he asked a teammate to tell the coach he'd miss practice, and Jaime said she had emailed the coach about her medical issues.

The school principal would not comment on Austin's case in particular, but issued a statement reading, "…all student athletes are given exceptions to attendance rules for their own health and the health of their family members. At no time would a student be penalized and/or dismissed from a team due to these types of excused absences."

"In this case, Austin missed four practices because of my health issues, because he was trying to wrap his head around the fact that his mother was very ill," said Jamie.

The family says they are victims of a coach following the strict rules of the game. Now this senior, has been sidelined.

"I wanted to keep things as consistent for him as possible," said Jamie.