Hi my name is Rachelle and my son Ryan was diagnosed with Cerebral  Palsy at 11 months of age. Throughout my pregnancy I had no complications and at 35 weeks my water broke and I delivered Ryan weighing 5 pds 9 oz he had laboured breathing therefore had to stay in the NICU for a couple days. Even though Ryan was a vaginal birth with no instruments used he had come out with a significant bruised head with a couple of abrasions.  I questioned the pediatrician about this while we were still in the hospital and they weren't concerned and told me not to put anything on the open wounds, just let it air dry. 

Ryan was discharged three days after delivery and we spent the rest of the week at my parents than headed home. His head started to heal and where you see the black spots of the picture above started to peal like as if it were a scab. His hair fell out and started to grow back in when he was a couple months old and where you can see the black ring in the picture above well it started to form a scar a big ring around his head formed and protruded out. We started to see a dermatologist and started to undergo test first we started with a biopsy that told us it was pretty much a keloid scar but they had never seen anything quite lik eit before. Also no one could give me an explanation how this had happened. In total we have seen probably over a dozen doctors and when we tell them there was no instruments or vacuum used during delivery they just look at us and tell us they have no idea. Where this keloid scar started to form hair wouldn't grow on it so we were given a steroid ointment to apply to the scar to help thin the tissue and promote hair growth. The ointment seemed to help a little eventually we were able to get Ry's hair to grow but only half his scar grew hair on it. So now only half the scar is visible but if you separate his hair u can see were the ring went completely around.

Ryan holding his teddy with his fists.

At  6 months of age he still wasn't able to open his hands. When we brought Ry in for his 6 month needles I questioned our family physician about this. She said that it was weird but because he was preemie and a boy he would need time catching up. I also told her that he was very floppy he wasn't able to sit well in a bumbo chair or saucer either and I got the same reply. We had another visit when Ryan was 9 months and by this time Ryan was still tightly fisted and wasn't not sitting up at all. I brought this up right away letting her know wthat I believed something was wrong and she was about to tell me that because he was 5 weeks premature it would take time for him to catch up to where he was suppose to be but because I was pretty dead set that there was something not right so she said she'd refer us to an OT in Oshawa. That November Ryan turn 11month sand we went to the OT appointment the Occupational therapist looked him over and than came in a pediatrician who looked at him as well. He did a few simple things with Ryan and turned to Cary and I and casually said well Ryan has Cerebral Palsy. I'll never forget that moment I think I might of been in shock......I was not prepared for that diagnoses especially without warning. I broke down and cried and cried...every time I looked at
Ryan I saw a child that would been in a wheelchair with a feeding tube. This was not the case though cause every child with CP has there own severity and they aren't really able to tell what and how it will affect them til later in life. That day we were referred to the Five Counties Children Centre in Lindsay On. At 1 yr of age he was still not able to sit on his own or even do a simple task such as opening his hands. Lack of oxygen to his brain resulted a decrease in fine and gross motor skills. Since CP effects muscle control Ryan also has difficulty eating because of the lack of muscle control in his jaw therefore, making it more difficult with chewing and swallowing. The sky is the limits and we work with Ryan everyday to help improve his way of life. Since we were told of his condition we have been actively involved with Five Counties Children's Centre where Ryan see's a Physiotherapist, an Occupational Therapist, and a Speach Therapist regularly as well as a Pediatrician who monitors his improvement. A special thanks to all his therapist cause within months of them working with Ryan he was able to open and close his hands and to sit independently by the age of 16 months.

Ryan with his hands much more relaxed and opened.

Shortly after that he started to learn to army crawl using his forearms to pull himself around and by about 20 months he was able to pull himself to his knees. We still had many issues with feeding. Ryan wouldn't attempt to bring food to his mouth or try any food that wasn't pureed. Though Ryan seemed to make great progress we couldn't help but want to give him so much  more. He is such a delightful and loving child that we wanted to give him every opportunity we could. We spoke with his therapist about trying to do two days a week but due to the high demand they couldn't give him more than one day a week (which is more than what some people get to start with) So I started to research on line to find something...........anything. I eventually came across a website about a camp in Ontario that does conductive education combined with oxygen therapy to help children with disabilities as well as adults that have disabilities or difficulties due to injuries or strokes etc. Cary (my husband), my mother and I drove out to see this camp which is located in Milford just on the outskirts of Picton Ontario.  After spending the day discussing Ryan's strengths and weaknesses  and what are expectations were, we headed home to talk it all over to see what our next step would be. We were given a list of many foundations to contact about funding so I started making phone call after phone to get hit with the hard realization that we didn't meet there requirements for funding and therefore couldn't receive money through them. I contacted all our local Lindsay service clubs but didn't get any reply’s and it seemed that the likely hood of Ryan attending this camp was not going to happen. Thankfully to the devotion of our family, friends and our small community (Espanola Ontario), where Cary and I spent most of our lives, came together and starting to collect donations. My mom, dad, and sister agreed to take care of our five month old son Cameron for five weeks making this all possible for me to attend this camp with Ryan. My mother in-law and father in-law went to great lengths to fundraise for us putting out jars to collect funds as well as collecting donations from people who wanted to help. Cary and I were rather touched by the incredible generosity of so many people. Thank you all so much for making this come true we'll never be able to tell you how much this means to us and what it'll do for our little Ryan. If it wasn't for all the generous donations having Ryan attend this camp wouldn't of been possible due to the costs of it. A special thanks goes out to the Espanola firehall/volunteer firefighters, Espanola firefighter choir, Greater Sudbury firefighters choir, Espanola's Lions club, Pricechopper, Espanola General Hospital and it's participating departments, Espanola General Hospital kitchen staff, Ernie Ross, Rod and Leslie Stewart, Dennis and Lynne Beilhartz, Jim Ramsay, Jeanno from Giant Tiger, Granpda Vlaad, Rock Taylor, Laurie Brault, Rae McNichol, Jen Dainty, Cynthia and Brian Suarez, and to everyone that allowed us to place a jar in there store or department (names to be posted at a later date), my friends and family, Cary's friends and family.  Also a special thank you to my brother in-law Bill Vlaad. Bill had a Christmas/40th birthday party were Bill requested if anyone wanted to purchase him a present was asked not to but instead a donation to be made to  Ryan's camp fund. So thank you Bill's friends and co-workers: Darcy Watson, Neil Mohammed, Paul Kang, Ian Schnoor, Andrew Grimes, Lawrence Moody, Heather Dunn, Michelle Donais, Stephane Gauthier, Shawn Zolberg, Sean Duckman. Thank you to anyone else who's name was not mentioned. I'll be up dating this frequently therefore some more names will be added at a later date.