Ariel M.

Date of Birth: May 15, 1994

Main Diagnosis: Brain damage, Epilepsy, GERD, Irritable Bowel, and more.

Featured: Oct. 2006

Parents:  Linn & Gilbert

Siblings: Daniel (8-11-92)
                  Michael (8-21-92)
                  Bret (10-8-88)                           serving in Iraq
                  Nicholas (2-3-87)

Limitations: Cognitively impaired, developmentally delayed.  Perception problems and Sensory Integration Disorder

Ariel's mental abilities are diminishing, so she can no longer recognize shapes.

Her mom wrote the following:

Ariel was born 3 weeks early and had severe Repiratory Distress Syndrome. She turned blue and was transferred to another hospital. After this, she had a lot of delayed development with crawling and walking.

At the age of 9, she got Osteomyelitis in her spine and had a Picc line for 6 weeks. Then she was in the hospital again for another week with c-diff.. She was very delayed with reading and understanding and has a very poor memory. (Seizures keep things from going on to long term memory.)

At the age of 12, Ariel was diagnosed with Epilepsy and Static Encephalopathy. At 13, she had several other diagnoses added. On June 8, 2009, Ariel went in to Status Epilepticus and had a 30 minute seizure. She was in Picu for a week. Since this time, she often goes in and out of Status.

She will soon receive a Make A Wish trip to Disney World.