Inspiration: Madison

My name Is Lisa Cooper and I am a wife and a mother of two girls. My family recently has had a difficult past two years. My children both have had serious life threatening illnesses.

My daughter Madison who is now 2½ years old recently had a brain tumor removed in February. She has been so strong and such a fighter since the day she was born.

When she was three weeks old she had her first seizure. Until she was almost 1 years old she was wrongfully diagnosed and improperly medicated. Madison still does not know life without medication, I live for the day that I can throw all her medication away and not stick another syringe in her mouth.

Finally my husband and I switched doctors and he explained to us that Madison has elipsey. Shocked as we were we then began the process to get her the help she needed. Madison was admitted every couple of months to introduce new medication because nothing seemed to stop her seizures. She had several MRIs and EEGs of the brain done, and all the time came back clear. Soon she was having 20 to 30 seizures a day. I then had to stop working because I could not leave her especially with the amount of medication she had to be given. Madison constantly had to be watched because she couldn’t talk to us because she was a baby so we had to figure everything out by keeping a log of her behavior through out the day. One time after Madison’s 24 hour hospital stay she came home with a stomach virus. It was a common stomach virus soon my older daughter Taylor caught it. Taylor’s virus attacked her brain leaving her with no fine motor or gross motor skills. She was in the hospital for three weeks. We were so devastated we did not no what was wrong with our baby. All we new was that she unable to move or speak. Soon when there was no more treatment to be had in the hospital we had to bring her home and basically turn our home into a hospital.

During that time Madison’s care was still the same, as she started growing we noticed more and more changes that were not right. Taylor soon after a month regained all her functions back and she is doing great now and continues to receive therapy to regain more strength. Madison’s struggle continued a little bit longer. My husband and I recevied counseling because we couldn’t believe what has been happening to our children. We hit a finical low which we are still trying to recover issuance was not so kind to us with two brain problems so our savings was cleared out. We just want our kids to be able to go back on a swing set without feeling week; hopefully we will be able to do that for them. After months of my own research I pushed for one more test. I pushed for a pet scan this soon told us that Madison had a brain tumor on the left side of her brain in her motor strip.

We were advised from several top surgeons that it had to be removed as soon as possible. We also were told that she would never be able to walk again.

We agreed with the surgery because she could not spend another day like she was.

Well it has been 6 months since Madison’s surgery and she is doing great and she can move both sides fine. She also continues to receive therapy because she has a slight weakness.

My kids have become my hero’s they are the strongest people I know and I really hope there struggles are over. I wish nothing but joy for them. I hope I am able to give back some wisdom I have learned and still am learning through this experience. This is why I contacted you wonderful foundation because I would love to help other and maybe my kids can be an inspiration to some other family.

The Guardian Brain Foundation encourages you to submit your words of encouragement to inspire others and provide emotional support.