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Who am I? Hi, Mykeah Simpson and I'm from San Diego, California born and raised. I'm a 25 year old recovering from a six year spinal cord injury. August 9, 2010 I was sleep in the back seats of my friends car without a seatbelt on, when a friend fell asleep behind the wheel causing a multiple car collision. From there I was admitted to a hospital, where I later woke up from a coma to learn my own story that changed my life forever. My injury level is C3-C7, where I broke my neck and it was fused back together. What now? Although I suffered from such a traumatic injury and life changing experience, I never let the limits of my physical being determine the limits of my life. Six years later I have beaten odd after odd doing things I couldn't see myself doing in the beginning. From having a job, getting back in school, writing my story, encouraging others, all the way down to being happy and content with my present and future, rather than focusing on my past. Kdsmart Chair Raffle Ticket fundraiser Giveaway I have a lot to accomplish this year as I do every year :). I've started 2017 off with the gift to give back (how awesome is that)! I have a BRAND NEW Kdsmart Chair (Kdsmartchair.com) that I got 2 months ago, yet it has never been used. I'm raffling the chair off, and reaching out to see if there may be anyone interested in joining the fun. Tickets are available at just $50 each, all participants need to do is buy their ticket(s) and await the Raffle drawing :). If anyone is interested or has questions please allow me to know by contacting me. I hope that all are blessed and exceeding the limits of their mobility and every way, shape, or form. Thank you & God bless! Contact information Mykeah Simpson Mykeahs@gmail.com 619-483-5530

Strengh in Adversity Hello my name is Vanessa, I am a dancer. I was born with my disability. I'm striving to become the best dancer that I can be. I'm constantly struggling for equal opportunities and I'm constantly hoping that one day more choreographers would be opened to working with disabled dancers. It was a difficult decision to embark in this journey where our society refuses to normalize disabled artist. I'm building a path for future disabled dancers and artists so that maybe one day it won't be full of rejections from auditions, where we are expected to reach beyond our own limitations, where we included not because of our disability but because of our artistry and passion. I've received more rejections and limiting roles than I can count. But I know if I keep pushing myself I know one day I will be cast in more challenging and meaningful dances that is more than just about my disability. It may not be in this life time where I will see these changes but I know it will happen if I keep creating and training and putting myself out there. My aspiration is to become a professional dancer and choreographer and I am ready for a real change for my community because we are still being segregated in many areas in society including the performing arts.

My Story On June 6, 2011 I went in for a very routine back surgery to correct the scoliosis in my spine. The plan was to place two rods on each side of my spine to straighten it. During the surgery my surgeon was placing the last screw at the T4 vertebra. Suddenly all motor and sensory was lost on the monitors and the surgery was aborted. My surgeon had made a drastic mistake. He punctured my spinal cord with the probe while attempting to place the screw. I woke up paralyzed from my chest down, unable to move or feel anything from the T4 level and below. In a matter of minutes I went from a Division 1 athlete to paralyzed. I woke up and was told I would never walk again. I spent 8 days in ICU before being transferred to the Rehabilitation Institute of Chicago to begin my journey. I spent 4 months at RIC undergoing extensive physical therapy in an attempt to defy the odds and walk again. It began with the slight wiggling of my toes and eventually grew to sitting up on my own, crawling, standing and eventually taking steps for the first time. Each small goal continued to be achieved all leading to the big goal of WALKING. I left RIC walking with the aid of forearm crutches. Something neurologists and surgeons all told me would be impossible. I continued my physical therapy and push every day to get stronger and better. I now walk to work in New York City every single day with the aid of a cane. I do not let my spinal cord injury define me. It is a part of me and I carry the struggles and triumphs of my journey with me wherever I go. I never once believed I would never walk again. I believed that impossible was nothing. Fitness and Goals I now use fitness to drive my progression every day. I am in the gym lifting, I use Peloton cycle to strengthen my legs through spinning, swim and I handcycle around New York. It is my goal to train for marathons in a racing wheelchair and eventually compete in the Paralympics. I continue to disable my limits everyday. Just because I have a spinal cord injury does not mean I cannot live the life I love. Challenges are made to be overcome. I would rather live a life filled with challenges, because a life with challenges is so much better than no life at all.

"My life is a blessing": Eric LeGrand My name is Eric LeGrand and I fractured my C-3 and C-4 vertebrae during a college football game in my junior year of Rutgers University that left me paralyzed from the neck down. The doctors had given me a 0 to 5 percent chance of regaining neurological function, but I never let that stop me or keep me down. Only four months after my injury, I had already regained movement in my shoulders and some sensation thanks to the time I spent at the Kessler Institute of Rehabilitation. I am very grateful for the resources that I had available during my recovery and was so humbled by the outpour of support that I was inspired to pay it forward and help others. While I've been so fortunate in my recovery, there are many people living with spinal cord injuries who don't have access to the proper resources. By creating @Team LeGrand and joining forces with the @Reeve Foundation, I'll be able to help people navigate the challenges of living with paralysis, and together we can achieve Christopher Reeve's dream of a world of empty wheelchairs. After my injury, I didn’t know what was next. Now I can honestly say that everything has been a blessing in my life and I am grinding every day to fulfill my purpose of helping others. All the support from the community inspires me to find cures for not only myself but everyone living with paralysis, and I'm not going to stop until I do. I truly believe that I will walk again one day. Until then, I will continue living life to the fullest and not let anything hold me back.

Adoption success For those you who are curious, I am originally from Ethiopia. 21 years ago, my parents heard a story on NPR about an agency placing children for adoption from Africa. They had 2 birth children and 2 adopted children already and after hearing the story on NPR they contacted the agency to learn more. The director of the agency, Americans for African Adoptions, had recently returned from Addis Ababa and told my mother about a little boy she had met in an orphanage there. He had had polio and walked with great difficulty using heavy braces and crutches. That was me! To make a very long story short, I came to live in America with my new family 2 years later! Anything is possible It took a long time for my family to bring me home and while I was waiting I contracted tuberculosis of the spine. I was dying. When I got to America I went straight to the hospital to get healthy. I didn't speak English but my first new word was juice! I had 2 surgeries to fuse my spine, gained lots of weight (no more starving Ethiopian) and started school for the first time. I was introduced to wheelchair sports and traveled all over the country competing in wheelchair track and field as well as basketball with my sister who also uses a wheelchair. After graduating from high school I took a tour of Guilford Technical Community College and saw a welding class. I knew right away I wanted to try it but my parents were worried about my safety. They agreed to let me try welding after the instructors said they could make it work and keep me safe. I fell in love with welding! I graduated with an Associates Degree in Welding Technology. I got my first job at Isometrics while I was still in school, moved on to a job at Tube Specialties in Statesville, NC and am now back at Isometrics. I am a hard headed, hard working, funny artist who enjoys creating new designs out of metal. What I have learned in my 21 years here is that anything is possible as long as you have a strong mind and dreams. Thanks to my parents for saving my life and making those dreams come true. I would give my life to them if need. I created my instagram @IvesRublee account to help others see the possibilities.

Our Situations Brought Us Together, Our Love Keeps Us Together Rey was injured 7 years ago in a motorcycle accident. He was around the corner from his house, riding his motorcycle and he was run off the road by a vehicle that never stopped. He is lucky to be alive today. 4 years ago, I went into surgery (able-bodied) to remove a large tumor compressed against my spine between T2-T8. I woke up from surgery paralyzed because although doctors were able to remove 45% of the tumor, it was completely compressed against my spine that my spine was affected during surgery. Rey and I met within the Spinal Cord Injury Support Group circle. He inspired me as I saw him living a complete life playing wheelchair basketball, racing in marathons and playing sled hockey. I was newly injured and didnt have anyone to relate to. Rey peer mentored me and our friendship began. It later evolved to my favorite love story! We now travel around the world together, work out together, SCUBA dive together and peer mentor together. Life goes on, love lives on!

How I sustained a spinal cord injury I fell through the deck of a half pipe onto the floor in February of 1999. I do not skate. It was in a DIY warehouse in Atlanta, Georgia where my band had played many times. I sustained a spinal cord injury (T 12 – L1) and while many people witnessed it, I don't really remember how it happened. The Realization of a New Life with a spinal cord injury l slowly started to understand the extent of my sudden paralysis, and tried to process my new spinal cord injury. I hadn't really thought about what I was going to do with my life as much as I was thinking how I would continue to live life as I previously had. Slowly through physical therapy and extreme endurance, I readapted to life. It was as if I was an infant again, but in a 29 year old body. I had to learn how to do everything; getting in and out of bed, going to the bathroom, taking a shower, getting into a car, brushing my teeth, learning how to drive, how to get up if I fall, etc. Deciding what to do after my Spinal Cord Injury Before I had my spinal cord injury I was a musician and a photographer. My band 'Kreamy 'lectric Santa' had been part of the DIY music community for over 20 years. If you're not familiar with the DIY music community, let me explain. DIY means 'do it yourself' and it allows you to connect with people who are part of the similar communities all over the world. The DIY community exists for art, literature, even building homes, but in the context of music, bands often tour independently. People host bands at their house or at independent venues of some sort. This allows the band to be able to tour and play their music without ties to corporate interests. So, after I was injured I had thought about whether I wanted to give up playing music or even being part of this community that I had been part of most of my life. A community that I supported and in turn has supported me, where I've met my closest friends, and provided a viable place to be open and creative. My answer was no. Realizations about the disability community When I started to play music in this environment, I began to realize that the ADA laws do not require someone to make their house or basement handicap accessible for gigs. Despite the obstacles, I found ways to get into these houses, basements, and warehouses and play my music. Often with guerrilla tactics such as crawling, being carried by people too drunk to walk (won't do that one again), or lifting myself and thumping up each step on my butt. As I did this repeatedly over the years, I began to realize that this community I had been part of so long, one that fought for the rights of women, people of color, and the LGBTQ community lacked activism for the disabled. There were so many times where I played the part of an audience member and realized the lack of awareness people had about my disability. I would get texts and invites to see many bands, but the information about the accessibility was pretty much vacant. If a woman, a person of color, or a person that was part of the LGBQ community were unsure if they could attend an event, there would always be a community fighting for their rights to be there. For a disabled person, you receive responses such as "I don't know if it's accessible", "Here's a number to call to find out if you can attend", or the worst — no reply at all. I began to realize how this lack of awareness for the disabled existed beyond my community. It became more and more evident that I had become part of another DIY community: The disabled community. Trying to navigate sidewalks with cracks that were so huge a wheelchair couldn't get over them was very similar to attempting to access someone's basement. The obstacle was there, and even though it is breaking the laws the ADA has put in place, you as a disabled person cannot expect a large group of people to rally for your rights. Instead you have to figure out how to navigate around it so you can live the life everyone else does. From Spinal Cord Injury to Taking Action In Advocacy When I see this kind of injustice I feel compelled to correct it. I feel change can only come from action. I began taking a couple of action steps to spread the word to the world. First is my body of photographic work, Completely Tilted Back, taken when I am completely tilted back in my wheelchair. The chair was equipped to do this because I suffer from a disease called neuropathy due to my spinal cord injury. It causes me to have great amounts of pain that is indescribable. To release pressure off the buttocks, increase circulation, and give me some relief, the chair tilts back to give me more independence to take part in everyday activities. This work celebrates the independence I have while showing what I see when I am tilted back at the various places I go to in my daily travels. You can see these photographs, and others, on my Instagram account (@pripee3) or the book that I self published. The second thing I did was start a website DIYabled (DIYabled.com) with a blog in which I talk about ways my independence is prohibited in the world I live, while also encouraging others to share their experience in hopes that it will raise awareness of what people with disabilities have to struggle with to obtain an independent life. The last thing, but certainly not the least, is the zine I'm working on which deals with handicap parking issues and why it is so important for disabled people to have these spaces available to them. I strive for people to know how important independence is to people with disabilities. Without it, a person's potential is not only wasted but it can lead to apathy and depression. These are very common issues for people with disabilities due to isolation. If I can encourage a disabled person to not let their disability keep them from living a full life, or make able bodied people understand what they can do to promote this independence, I consider my efforts a success.

These are my dreams Hi I'm new to yoocan. I'm a 15 year old girl who has cpl. I'm in a wheelchair and my dreams are to live independently by getting strong, getting fit and completing school. I go to the gym once a week and before starting at the gym, I could not lift myself off my chair. Now I can do it, and many other things such as getting off the toilet, in the shower shower and etc.

Pregnancy Our first scan took my breath away. There on a grainy screen was our tiny little baby that I had started to grow all by myself. Wasn't my body just so amazing! Then came that phone call. The one that said we needed to come in again. There's something they need to double check. The images aren't clear enough. I told myself (and my husband) that it would be fine. Just unclear pictures. The doctor didn't sound worried, why should we be? But then the day arrived and I saw our perfect child, and they said that maybe she wasn't all that perfect. They said it looked like spina bifida. They called in a consultant. He confirmed it, he explained what it was, what it could mean. I didn't stop staring at the screen the entire time. Most of it just blurred into the background, and if my husband hadn't squeezed my hand so tightly, I might have been able to convince myself that it was just a bad dream. But it wasn't. He told us the options, he told us we could abort, he said we could try again and I would be given much stronger folic acid. Still I stared. I knew nothing and no one could make me give up my child. Nothing could make me hurt them. Trying again just wasn't an option, I had miscarried at 6 weeks, before they had been visible to the ultrasound, and it had felt like my world had caved in. Our baby was 17 weeks, we were nearly half way. They had their own features, you could see her nose, her legs. She was a whole person. We loved this little person so much -- we didn't want just any baby, we wanted this one. We cried through Christmas. We cried on and off for about 2 weeks while we fought with our inability to give up our child, and our little baby's quality of life. The consultant rang us. He said because of the location where the spine hadn't formed - there was a good chance the child would walk. He said her bladder might be affected, it probably would. But in terms of mobility, the child was very lucky. In simple terms, if you were going to have spina bifida, this is where you would want it. She would definitely need an operation as soon as she was born, but as there was no hydrocephalus yet, maybe not a shunt. So -- we declined the abortion. We declined their amniocentesis test. We decided we were going to bring our child into the world. (And she was a little girl!) We decided that we were strong enough to deal with whatever her disability threw at us. It wasn't fine, we weren't okay. Our baby was still due to spend the first six to eight weeks of her life in hospital. My plan for a natural birth was spoiled with the information that hospitals preferred c sections to make sure we didn't cause any more damage to her spine. Gone were our visions of daddy cutting the cord, gone were my images of having my new baby on my chest... Everything we had planned was now being dictated to us. Of course we complied for the health and wellbeing of our daughter, but suddenly it wasn't our pregnancy anymore. It was the pregnancy of countless ultrasound operators, consultants, surgeons, doctors, nurses, midwives. Everyone had to know our story, and everyone had to have their role. I was poked and pricked, my blood was taken, I was injected with steroids, countless hospital visits, delays of hours in waiting rooms, seeing the ward our daughter would be kept in, hearing the worst possible scenarios, hearing we couldn't touch our daughter while she was in special care unless our hands were 100% clean of any cells, the list went on. But then I felt her moving, and responding to our voices. I found myself talking to her about my day, and holding her on my commute. And she was worth every breath or sterilised air I had to take. She was worth every waddle to the nurse wanting more blood from me, and every panic I had about her future. I took these jobs in my stride because I knew she would be the most perfect babe. She would be all ours, and we would do our upmost to keep her safe from the world. We were told during pregnancy that she would be taken for the operation straight away and because of how small she was, she would be in hospital for 4-6 weeks. We accepted that and came to terms with it. We accepted that she would be in an incubator, we accepted we would have an empty house and a commute to see her every morning. We accepted that she would be tube fed and I would have to express instead of being able to seal our bond through breast feeding. We accepted that 6 weeks of her life would be spent by her bedside while she recovered, and we accepted that we would not be granted the usual luxury of holding her without being surrounded by tubes. When she was born, however, and they took her away to be checked over and prepared for surgery - the reality of what was about to happen kicked in. I felt a giant empty space inside me, I felt the loneliness of no longer having my babe connected to me physically, and no child in my arms to connect to emotionally. I wanted to scream and cry. I wanted my baby to come back to me. I missed her with every fibre of my being, and I could no longer bear the thought of having her inside a plastic box for the next 6 weeks. I needed her, and all of the acceptance and peace I had made with our decision came crashing down around me. I had thought it would be so much easier to do what was best for her medically. But my whole body ached to have her back, ached to have her close to me. It's like she knew. My husband came into see me, his voice was shaking as he said they didn't want to do the operation yet. We can go home, just as soon as I had recovered. Originally they thought there would be a hole in her back which made her susceptible to infections, namely meningitis. But while the hole still existed, it was covered with skin. And then we left. Not as the two that we thought we would, but as a family of three. I could never describe the feeling of elation that followed. We were able to hold her and kiss her, we were able to dress her and play with her and hold her close whenever she cried. We were able to cradle her without manoeuvring around wires. I was able to happily breast feed and I didn't have to pump it out to feed her via a tube. Everything we had never thought we would do for our newborn, we had been given the green light to do. And I know there will never be a happier day in our lives than the day she was able to come home. But in that moment it was easy to forget that we would have to come back - that we were not out of the woods just yet. Hospital They asked us to bring her back in 6 weeks. They said to feed her and fatten her up and she would do better with the operation because she would be bigger. They said we would be in hospital for 3-7 days, they said no incubator. Naturally it seemed amazing to us, all new and naive to having a disabled child. I started planning visits to see my mum for the week after her operation. We arrived at the hospital on Sunday afternoon, nervous for what the future held. They tried desperately to put a cannula in and take her blood but she screamed and kicked and they admitted defeat. Her blood was taken via a heel prick and her cannula would be put in when she was under general anaesthetic. We signed their papers, we held hands tightly as the doctor read out his list of potential side effects and later reassured ourselves that they have to tell you everything, it's the law, yes, Lola would be fine. We left Lola in the hands of a lovely nurse and went across the road to the Ronald McDonald house to try and get enough rest to take our minds off of the impending operation. The next day we headed over in the early hours to see our daughter and check that she was doing okay. Her attempts to smile at us when she saw our faces put my mind at ease, she was our little fighter, she had all the strength that I had prayed she would have. She would be fine. We dressed her in a gown that was the smallest size but made her look like a tiny doll in clothes three sizes too big. In that moment I thought that she was still too little, she was still too fragile to have such a huge operation. I held her in my arms as we walked to theatre. My heart felt heavy and there was an unmovable lump in my throat - but I knew I had to put on a brave face, I knew I had to be strong for my little girl, I knew that in the end we would thank the surgeons. My husband put on his scrubs, and I kissed Lola as he walked her into the room, lay her on the table, and watched her fall asleep. I stood outside clutching one of her toys, breathing in her scent and praying she would be okay, praying she would wake back up and we could go home and continue our bliss-filled life as a family of four. We went for breakfast, both reassuring each other. She was in safe hands, they did this operation all of the time, she would be okay, she was a fighter, she would be right as rain. And then we sat and waited. I felt sick to my stomach, I just needed a sign that she was okay, I couldn't think of anything else. When the phone rang and my husband answered it, I honestly thought the worst. I thought she's not woken up. I thought it's gone wrong. I thought I've lost my baby. And I nearly cried, until he caught hold of my hand. She's okay, he said. We can go and see her now. We raced to the hospital, I didn't really believe she was ok, I had to see for myself. And then I held her again. She was upset and confused and longing for the comfort of my milk, but she was alright. We had made it! They told us that they hadn't put a shunt in, because they didn't think she needed it. For those who don't know, (which is probably everyone because we didn't know until Lola was born either) a shunt is essentially a valve that sits permanently under the skin and sucks out excess fluid from a ventricle in the brain and drains it into your tummy where the stomach acid basically disposes of it. It's a cure for hydrocephalus, which they weren't 100% sure she had. Because she didn't have a shunt, they needed us to stay the full week to monitor her and be sure she didn't need one. By the end of the week they had realised that she would, so she was booked in for operation number two only a week after she had had number one. I can't really put my feelings about that situation into words. I felt joy at my baby being ok and her nerves being back in her body and not having her cry every nappy change because the sack of fluid on her back was uncomfortable. But at the same time I felt slightly deflated. In the moment I had seen Lola's little face and heard her little cry, I wanted to take her back home and let her have chance to be a 'normal' baby and live a 'normal' life. But, as with every encounter with medical professionals, I told myself it would be okay. It's for the best, they said, it will help her develop properly. Without a shunt, the fluid will build up, it will cause headaches and delay every kind of development. So, it was a necessary evil, I figured. A day before the operation, Lola wouldn't stop crying. Her infection markers didn't show what the doctors needed it to. Her temperature kept spiking. Something was wrong. Something besides her hydrocephalus. They pricked her and took her blood until she cried herself to sleep. They couldn't find what was wrong, they said it must be a UTI, it's common in baby girls. Still, they can't do the operation if she has an infection. The next day I saw her and I knew something wasn't right. She was not my happy little girl, she looked so defeated, so sad. That sounds almost crazy that a 6 week old baby could look sad, but she did, and it broke my heart. Anyway, after that the neurosurgeon came to see us. They often did, to check on Lola, to see how she was getting on. This time it seemed more sincere. He said they needed to do a 'tap.' They needed to put a needle through her soft spot into her ventricle and take out fluid. This would tell us whether the infection she had was contained in her spinal fluid. We were pushed out of the room. He came to see us. The neurosurgeon said the fluid was going away for testing, he said it was most likely infected as it wasn't a clear colour, it was cloudy. They got the results back. She needed another operation. Tonight, as an emergency. They needed to insert a tube into her brain, and this would be connected to a bag. The tube would draw out the infected fluid. She would also need antibiotics, this particular strand of E. coli that had affected her, needed a course of 6 weeks. I tried to hold it together, I really did. But I sobbed, I sobbed and I sobbed and I didn't pull myself together for a long time. All I could think about was how unfair life was. It had dangled our freedom in front of us, and ripped it away. In a cruel twist of fate, we were due to spend longer in hospital than we had meant to when she was born. Again I had these feelings, she's not going to wake up, it's all going to go wrong. We took her down to the theatre again, we met the on call neurosurgeon, we held each other and our daughter, and wished we would wake up from this nightmare. But we didn't. Little Lola, in her gown, fell asleep under general anaesthetic for the second time in her short life. And we went for food. We went to the same place, wishing for a good luck charm. Hoping she would be okay. I could barely eat. I wanted to burst into tears. I had not prepared myself for this. They tell you everything that could go wrong, and we all convince ourselves that it won't be us. We did it again. We said she would be fine. But she wasn't. She woke up, we saw her, she was alive. But she couldn't breathe properly. Her voice was raspy and she couldn't cry normally. They had grazed her throat with the breathing tube, they had to give her steroids to inhale to help her breathe. The mask scared her and made her try to cry some more. My heart shattered. My poor helpless child with a tube in her brain and six weeks of hospital ahead of her. Why would life punish someone so helpless by adding more misery to her plate? We stayed by her side as we walked to the ward. She started behaving differently. I spotted it and couldn't work out what was wrong. And then we were back in her room, and she did it again... She was having seizures. I remember screaming. I remember crying so loud I actually started to scream. I held onto her hand so tightly as she lost control of her body for several seconds and then tried to cry. It was all too much. My husband pulled me from the room and held me. He told me I had to be strong, that I could be strong, that she needed us to be strong for her. We all stayed up all night. We had nurses bringing coffee, and helping us through one of the most horrific times of my entire life. I couldn't help her, I couldn't do anything for her except be there. I was a mess, he was a mess. If there is one piece of advice I can give to you from this, it's to marry someone who you would want by your child's bedside if they got sick. The support of my husband saw me through that night, nothing more and nothing less. I could never have done that alone. They gave her anti seizure medicine. It was a temporary measure. They thought the seizures were being caused by the placement of the tube. It was apparently rubbing against certain nerves and causing her to fit. I held onto the hope that she might not have to live with this forever. A few days later, some of my family came to London to see Lola. We went out for lunch, and received a call. Lola had fitted again, violently. They were taking her to an intensive care ward where they could monitor her more closely. They put in a feeding tube to make it easier for her to eat and breathe at the same time. I cried. I felt like I was in a bad dream I couldn't wake up from. Luckily we had some really lovely nurses on that ward. My milk had started to dry up, the nurse told me not to stress myself about it. She said that's what the hospital had supplies of milk for. She told us to go and get lots of rest. For the first time in a very long time, we slept soundly. She was in good hands, and they had so much more one-to-one care. We were moved from that ward pretty quickly. Which was good news in terms of Lola's recovery, as she hadn't had a fit in a long enough period of time for them to deem that the seizure medicine was working and that she was well enough to be back in the other ward. We had adapted quickly to hospital life. We had a routine, we knew the nurses, we knew what they needed from us and from Lola. The doctors were happy with her progress - though sometimes it felt like your whole life was on display to the dozen medical professionals that visited at any one time. As we approached the end of her six week period of antibiotics, her tube fell out. As well as draining out infected fluid, they also used this to check white blood cell levels to make sure that the infection was clearing. At this point she had turned around completely. She was happy again. She had learnt to smile properly. We received big toothless grins from our little cherub. She noticed the world, she was back to being our curious, inquisitive, light-up-the-room-with-happiness little girl. Then they said they wanted to do another operation to put the tube back in. They wanted to check the infection had cleared. Her white cell count was low but not gone. We refused. How could you not see the improvement? She was so much better now. And they called in the head neurosurgeon and he agreed - no operation. In fact, he said, you can take her home. And then we left hospital as a three again. We were not finished on our long road though. We had three more operations to go. The first two were to clean parts left over from the infection off of her brain. The infection had blocked ventricles and the doctor wasn't sure if we needed a shunt or if the fluid was building because of the blockages. The final operation was for a shunt. The thought of the shunt had made us both very nervous when we had expected it in July. But being three months down the line and having gone through so much, we had completely come to terms with it. We almost welcomed it, since it heralded the potential end to her staying at hospital. All three operations were a success, and we barely stayed in hospital more than 3 days after each. There were moments of panic between hospital trips. The fluid in her head didn't have anything to stop it, so she had days of having headaches and screaming at me, and I had days I had to take her to hospital just to be sure she was okay. There were midnight trips up when her head started leaking spinal fluid, many more late nights worrying, and being on the phone to the ward more than I would care to admit. Now The seizures stopped when the tube fell out and the medicine was stopped. My breast milk dried up, but she took really well to formula, and I feel she is no worse off than her peers. Lola has her shunt, and will do for life, unless medical advances eliminate the need for it, or if she grows over 6ft and needs a longer tubing inside her. It's working well (touch wood) and is keeping her able to do things that every other baby can learn to do. She is thriving, crawling, learning things at her own pace. She is very stranger aware, and doesn't tend to like boys unless you are her daddy or her favourite surgeons at hospital. She has physiotherapy every month as a precaution, but they are confident she will walk soon. She was late to crawling, but we put that down to losing so much time in and out of hospital and battling the excess fluid in her head. We check her head circumference at regular intervals to make sure her shunt is still working, and are now onto six monthly check ups with the hospital. The months we spent by her bedside waiting for her to recover seem like a bad dream. She learns new things every day. She makes us so proud every single day. A consultant told before she was born that she probably wouldn't walk. She is trying so hard to prove him wrong. Our little girl defies everything we had been taught to be true during my pregnancy. She made us believe in miracles, she made us see how possible it is to smile through every hardship, and make us feel like the luckiest two people to be chosen as her parents.

A bit about Dexter... Dexter is five. He is cheeky and happy, determined and brave. And, a little stubborn. He was born premature. HIs brain damage was found at 30 days. He spent 122 days in three NICUs, before coming home. He has severe quadriplegic cerebral palsy and requires support with everything. He has cortical vision impairment and is non-verbal *but very noisy! He was diagnosed with hepatoblastoma (liver cancer) at 13 months and required chemotherapy, surgeries and countless transfusions. He is now 4 years cancer clear. Dexter is about to start mainstream kindergarten. He's a great kid, who loves adventures. For more about Dexter, check out this post on his website: http://lovedexter.weebly.com/blog/who-is-dexter Thanks for reading our first story! We'll be back to share some of his adventures.

You have within you right now everything you need to deal with whatever the world throws at you. I have been living life as a type 1 diabetic since I was 4 years old. It was May of 2016 when I woke up one day with tingling in my feet I immediately thought diabetic neuropathy because it was the most logical explaination. But when I went to my endocrinologist she told me everything was fine. I still had no answers and was more confused than ever. Over the next few days it only got worse and the tingling progressed up my legs and caused muscle weakness. It got to the point where I was having problems walking so I went to an ER to get some answers. After getting MRIs and blood work with nothing showing up I was sent home with a diagnosis of lower back pain and muscle weakness. Well, that did not satisfy me. Within 2 days I was in the hospital because I physically couldn't even walk 10 steps to the bathroom. I was in the ER and got admitted within 30 minutes. After more MRIs, spinal tap, blood work, etc, I got the diagnosis of Multiple Sclerosis. I had never heard of this disease before and after some research I thought 'okay, I can handle this'. Boy was I wrong because I also got the diagnosis of Transverse myelitis. Now normally it takes care of itself and people are left with very minor side effects. Not me. After months of not being able to walk my doctor told me that I was a rare case where the TM killed off about half of my spinal cord. I was dumb founded. Who the heck even knew this was a thing?! Not me! I have had my ups and downs over the course of these past few months but if anything I have learned who was truly there for me and cared for me. I am currently wheelchair bound and unable to return to normal life but I have learned a lot. 1) Not everything can be seen by the naked eye (MS is known as the snowflake and invisible disease) 2) There is a huge stereotype when it comes to anyone with a physical disability 3) Life puts you through many obsticals but it's who comes out stronger who receives the most wisdom. Life does not always go as planned, but life takes you where you are destined to be. God only gives the hard situations to his strongest soldiers.

32 years old polio survivor travel 25.000 km all by herself on modified bike My name is Shinta Utami. When I was 4 years old, I got polio. After the fever had gone, my parents found I could no longer walk. I was lucky because many victims are paralyzed forever but, eventually, I learned to walk again in my own very strange and painful way. Some days, I could walk half a kilometer and some days it hurt so much to walk only 100 meters. Recently, I tore three of my left ankle ligaments and so I have to be using a wheelchair. The doctor said that some of my ankle problems are because of post polio syndrome. That means that I start to experience gradual weakening in muscles that were previously affected by my illness. In 2013, my father modified my sister’s scooter for me. This was my first modified scooter and having it allowed me to ride around like a normal person. And that is how my passion for travel began. With my scooter, I am able to see and do things that I always wanted to do. One day, I set off from my home and didn’t stop riding until I’d ridden across all of Indonesia. I rode 24,488 km in 34 provinces. After my trip, in 2015, I was invited to the palace to meet the president of Indonesia and I was awarded a record in the Indonesian Records Museum for “The longest distance traveled on a modified scooter by a physically challenged person”. On March 2017 I will wheeling my manual wheelchair from Yogyakarta to Jakarta, which is around 530 km. I will do this journey using only my own muscle power and my own willpower. I always have passion for inspiring and motivating people and will use this trip to raise awareness of people with dissability's rights in Indonesia and try to change public perception of people with disability. This is my way of touching people’s lives to let them know that we should always be excited to push ourselves to the limits, get out of our comfort zones, and see how big our world is. I am pushing myself to my physical and emotional limits just so I can live out a dream and hopefully, in the process, inspire someone else. limitedwithoutlimits .com