Wednesday, September 25, 2013

Annalise Walks!

Today Annalise took her first steps for the second time in her life.  At the age of 17 months Annalise was walking very well.  In fact, she had just begun to run.  Then suddenly, she began to lose her balance and before long, she was no longer able to walk without support.  She began using doll strollers to help her balance and walk.  Soon that became too difficult as well and she began walking with a walker.

She has been working really hard for months on being able to stand without assistance.  In just the last couple of months, she has gone from only being able to stand for about 10 seconds to now being able to stand up to about 3 minutes at a time.  Today her PT Lauren was here working with her and so was Lauren's supervisor, Ray.  We were talking about the things she is now able to do and he suggested we see how she would do if we asked her to walk.  So he did and she tried to take off really fast.  She didn't get more than about a half a step before falling into Lauren.  Then Ray explained to her that she should try just taking one step and then find her balance and then take another step.  To go really slow, like a turtle.  So she did.  She ended up taking up to 7 consecutive steps while walking today.

By the end of the session, she was very tired, but she was very happy as well.  I was also very happy and I will admit, still in a little shock.

Now for those of you who know about Annalise's journey, you know that medically this is not supposed to happen.  We have believed for years that she and Bryce had Leukodystrophy and that once the skills were lost, they would never be regained!  Well, it appears that God and Annalise have other plans!  Today we truly witnessed a miracle.

To see some very cool videos of Annalise's first steps join us on Facebook