Grace Meek Morgantown, WV, United States

C3-C6, February 2006

On February 1, 2006, our healthy 7 year old daughter, Grace, suffered a rare cervical spine cord stroke, between C3-C6. She was unable to move anything from the neck down. We have performed many, many tests but we still do not have an explanation for the stroke. Grace spent the next 5 weeks at West Virginia University Hospital and then the next 4 months at Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, MD. Grace has been weaned from the ventilator and no longer has G-tube. Grace is currently enrolled full time in the fourth grade and is performing exceptionally well making straight A’s. She works extremely hard and maintains a very positive attitude. Grace does have some movement in her upper body but does not have full strength or full range of motion. She loves to play on the laptop computer, Nintendo DS, and to text on her cell phone. She does her school work by herself and writes in cursive. She is an avid artist and really enjoys coloring in coloring books. We know there is a cure out there. We just have to find it. If a cure is found, the possibilities are endless for the future for SCI.