On July 17, 1999, Mikayla, was born 4 months early weighing in at just over 1 lb. With being a "micro-preemie" she suffered a Grade IV hemorrhage on her left brain. At that time doctors could not tell us what impact that would have on her life. What we were told was that any early intervention therapy would be key to retraining the right side of her brain to do what the left side was no longer capable of doing. One year later, Mikayla was diagnosed with Spastic Diplegic Cerebral Palsy with severe developmental delays and also an autism spectrum disorder.

The past several years Mikayla has undergone many hours of speech therapy, occupational therapy, and physical therapy. She also has successfully graduated from a 2-year structured preschool program for autistic children and is now moving onto a kindergarten program for autistic children.

Mikayla is a very bright and highly motivated child even though there is a communication barrier, some behavior barriers, and many physical limitations. She does not speak but she does communicate a little bit through sign language. Although her severe fine motor delays do not let her little fingers sign exactly right so we are now in the process of teaching her a new way of communicating through picture symbols.

Mikayla’s determination (and stubbornness) to be like all the other kids has only helped her succeed given all the disabilities she has to deal with on a daily basis. She has overcome so many obstacles that even her doctors have been surprised by her successes.

Mikayla has been having botox injections in her legs for the last 3 years. This is a type of therapy that has allowed the muscle tone in her legs to be broken down (botox is used to breakdown muscle) so that we could work on building up the right muscles in her legs. Although this treatment is completely temporary and wears off over time it has been successful for her in the past 3 years. She overcame the odds and proved she could crawl. Then she overcame the odds and proved she could walk with a reverse walker and leg braces. And finally she overcame the odds and proved she could walk without assistance.

However, upon her 5^th birthday it was the turning point to find a more permanent solution for treating her cerebral palsy. With the botox treatments not being as effective as they have been in the last 3 years we have been forced to look at other options before she loses the ability of walking, something the doctors never saw her doing in the first place.

 Mikayla will underwent her first of several neurological surgeries where they will place a pump (the size of a hockey puck) inside of her stomach which will send medication, baclofen (a type of muscle relaxer), directly through her spinal cord to her nerve roots. This will reduce some of the spasticity (muscle tone) in her legs so that we can try to permanently retrain her muscles to work properly. The key to the success of this surgery is actually the many hours afterwards of training her muscles through different types of therapiess.

  As any family who has a child with special needs, the expenses are great. But it is the small little miracles that Mikayla shows us as she overcomes so many obstacles thrown at her that remind us of why she was given to us. In spite of all the time spent away from home we continue to have faith in the doctors, nurses, therapists, and teachers who constantly remind us there are angels among us. We know this for a fact: we tuck one in every night. Her name is Mikayla.

With all our love and thanks,

Aaron and Mandy Marvel