I had a brain bleed due to a ruptured brain AVM back on April 4, 2017. I was only 8 years old back then. I spent 3 months in the hospital before I was discharged, and I was in a coma for 2 weeks after an emergent brain surgery on that night to drain out the blood. When I woke up from the coma, I had barley any physical abilities and there were great deficits. I was barely able to move or walk or even eat or drink anything. I was discharged to a rehab center where I stayed for a week until I was able to go back home. About 2 years later, I had another brain surgery to close off the wound. I needed four because each time the surgery closed a fourth of the wound. After the second surgery I started having weakness on my left side which was my dominant side (I was born a lefty). I went ahead and had the 2 surgeries. After these 4 surgeries, I was transferred to a hospital for a radio operation called gamma knife. The hospital was out of state because the one I had all my surgeries at until that point didn’t have the technology for it. The out of state hospital had the technology but the operation was never done on a child so I was transferred to an in-state hospital that was a 4 hour drive. I did the first operation there and everything was the same after the first operation. Then about 6 months later I returned for the second operation. After that operation my weak side got a good amount of strength back. After about a few weeks from the surgery I would have bad headaches throughout the night and day. Eventually I was taken to that first hospital which is called St Christopher’s Hospital for Children. At St Chris I got hospitalized and was given multiple medicines to try and help out with the headaches but my hand got even weaker than before.

This picture shows how I’m getting some normality back in my life. This was for junior prom a few years ago. Currently I’m working on applying to college and some projects to help people like me. I started a Facebook page called Beyond the Injury.

Connecting with the Niekro Foundation has benefitted me and made me grateful to have such people help and it made me want to help out those who might be going through the same experience.

My words of hope and advice for others is always stay positive no matter how dark it may seem – there’s always light at the end of the tunnel.