Valerie stable and anxious to go to Houston

Valerie stable and anxious to go to Houston

Valerie Update:

Lavonna Redman of Angel Notion was in town last week working on Valerie's case. Lavonna found a local pediatrician who has a huge heart for children with disabilities and has agreed to see Valerie and guide us through her care. There is a team of doctors awaiting Valerie’s arrival, we will have every kind of specialist that will be needed to diagnose and treat Valerie in the most successful way.

We plan to have Valerie in Houston as early as this coming Friday

We have come to the decision that in order for us to truly help Valerie long term, we must also help her mother. Valerie's mother, Alexandra, will be coming to Houston with Valerie to take part in getting her the medical care that she needs. Most importantly, she will be here to learn to accept, love and care for her child. Our goal is to surround Alexandra with a community of support that will guide her in making positive changes in her life for herself and her daughter.

Can you imagine living in the conditions that she has to live in? There are no options, no assistance and no education. I personally can imagine being very tired, with out hope or really anything to look forward to. Angel Notion and Carrie's Heart, along with you and other volunteers, are going to give her mother the self esteem and all the tools to be able to handle this job that she has been given. Our vision is that Alexandra will have the experience to be able to teach others in her community what one needs to do in the case their child is born with a disability. I see that Alexandra may have the capacity to hold a job with Angel Notion in a new clinic in Cozumel dedicated to children with severe disabilities. Mothers like Alexandra will assist others in their community who are in similar circumstances. There is great need on the island of Cozumel - children are being born everyday with difficult circumstances on the Island!

The scope of the Valerie Project has broadened. Both Angel Notion and Carrie's Heart operate under the principles of love, acceptance and above all education. It is important that Valerie's mother learns to love and care for her child so that she can return home and share her knowledge with other mothers. The larger goal of the Valerie Project is one of education - educating parents and communities about the rights and needs of their children. Education combined with resources to help families in the care of their children is the way to truly making a difference in each child's life and in the local community.

NEEDS:

Our needs are funding for the Ronald Mc Donald house, air and local transportation, medical costs (which we expect to be approx 10k), needs for Valerie include warm clothes, a stroller, nutritional supplement, personal care products, diapers. For Valerie’s mother - clothes, shoes, personal hygiene items, counseling / therapy costs (approx 1000.00). We have raised about 45% of what we need in order to complete this mission. We expect this particular mission will cost approx 15,000.00 dollars… not a lot consider we are changing an Island, a family and most importantly Valerie’s life!

We thank you in advance for your support of this mission.

Please note that you can receive a tax deduction in the US by contacting carrie@carriesheart.org and tax deduction in Mexico by contacting Lavonna@angelnotion.org

This photo is of a rooster tied up out side valeries door... for me its so symbolic of valeries situation.

Dr. Peter Lapine MSU and Sparrow Hospital

http://newsbulletin.msu.edu/mar3006/mexico.html

IN MEMORY OF A HERO I NEVER GOT TO MEET

SARA AN ANGEL WHO TOUCHED MANY......


I will tell you why I am so interested in your project. My daughter, Sarah passed away this weekend. Please read the attached, and you will understand. Sarah was born without arms and legs, but lived a great life for 28 plus years, married and happy in New York City. Sarah was a fighter as you will see below.

My heart goes out to you for what you do. I am sure you feelings are the same as mine when you lose one of your children.

May God be with you in your journeys.

Barry

Young champion of the disabled dies

Former Byrd High student earned national award for her volunteer work

April 13, 2006

Sarah Hoffman at age 16 in 1994. (Times File Photo)

FUNERAL
Services for Sarah Hoffman Snyder will be held at 2 p.m. April 22 at St. Matthias Episcopal Church, 3301 St. Matthias Drive in Shreveport.

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By Teddy Allen
teddy@gannett.com

Sarah Hoffman Snyder, born with no arms and limited lower extremities yet a champion for those with disabilities, fooled a lot of people in her life, including her own mom.

"Who would have thought that someone with such an immense physical disability would be able to fly as far as she flew, to travel as many miles as she did, to be as capable as she was? Certainly not her mother," said Mary Ellen Hoffman of her daughter, who as a C.E. Byrd student received one of only six national 1994 Special Achievement Awards for her help of the disabled.

Surrounded by much of her immediate family, Snyder, 27, died Sunday in New York City of complications from liver failure. She had been hospitalized a week and had been in intensive care for two days, her mother said.

Snyder had lived in New York since 2001, when she married Jason Joseph Snyder, at the time a member of the U.S. Navy and stationed in Saratoga Springs, N.Y.

"I think so many people (in Shreveport) played a role in Sarah being able to be who she was," Hoffman said. "They were touched by Sarah, and she was touched by them. She's gone, but we want everybody to remember the remarkable things she had the courage to be. She had virtually no limbs; it says a lot that she had the courage to face each day."

By age 15, she'd already shared more than 2,000 hours of herself at Schumpert Medical Center as a Junior Volunteer. As a Byrd senior in the fall of 1995, she wrote a Letter to the Editor of The Times questioning why the new two-story Science Technology building at her school had no elevator.

"We have a mayor in a wheelchair (Shreveport's Bo Williams), the Americans with Disabilities Act and 12 disabled students enrolled at Byrd," she wrote, "and all we got was the shaft."

"She was so independent," said Melanie Samuel, now a Byrd office employee who was the "child-specific aid" for Snyder for three and a half of the teen's four years at Byrd.

"That was just a title because she really didn't need me. Her support system was so great, half of the time I didn't know where she was," Samuel said. "She was normal. She was just normal. She got into trouble, she did the same things any other kid would do. And once she got the swing of it, that was it: she didn't really need me. She's unforgettable."

"She'd say things from the back seat of the car like, 'Scoot the seat up, mama; I don't have enough leg room,'" Hoffman said. "She was funny, curious, personable. She had the same dreams as other people; she just had limits and had to learn how to get around them ...

"Now she's limitless. She's not tethered to this Earth by any of the things that held her ... she's soaring. Her fight is over."

©The Times

April 13, 2006

EDGAR GOES THRU OPENHEART SURGERY LIKE A SHOOTING STAR

Edgar has his surgery open heart surgery by Dr. Jorge Salazar in San Antionios Santa Rosa Cristus childrens hospital. He was literally in the hospital for two days and he is now running around like a normal child... Thanks to all of you who made this a possibilitiy.