Autism elbowed into Maryann Jackrel’s life last year when her daughter, Stephanie, 37, died of an intracranial brain hemorrhage. Suddenly, the rapid-fire-talking retired legal assistant and discount shoe business owner from Brooklyn was the caregiver of her four grandchildren. Their names all begin with A: Adryanna, 14; Alyssa, 8; Anthony, 7; and Alyjah, 5. No …
Continue reading "Daughter’s sudden death leaves grandmother with four special-needs kids"
It seems cosmically unfair that Nikki Kangas was the one who was gobsmacked last summer, when she learned those back pains that had been plaguing her weren’t related to a patient-moving injury the veteran nurse suffered a while back, but the salvos in a battle her body was losing to an aggressive cancer. After all, …
Continue reading "Cancer death of loving nurse leaves two girls to build a new life with grandparents"
“I can’t wait to get back to school. I want to see all my friends. I want to be a normal kid again,” says Brieanna, 13, who is being home-schooled in the Port St. Lucie home where she lives with her parents and older brother, Braden. Cancer thundered into the family’s life on March 24, …
Continue reading "Teen wants to ‘be a normal kid again’"
Every morning, Evelyn Santana changes diapers, checks the breathing tube and gently strokes the cheek of her 20-year-old daughter Priscilla Diaz. Diagnosed with cerebral palsy and Rett’s Syndrome as an infant, Diaz is unable to talk, walk or feed herself. When not on one of her constant doctor appointments, the dark-haired young woman spends her …
Continue reading "Mom finds ‘sunshine’ in caring for daughter with cerebral palsy"
Juana Hernandez remembers the wee hours of July 7 when she was awakened by one of her three children coughing. The room in her West Palm Beach apartment was dark, and she was having trouble breathing. She soon realized that the room was ablaze and filled with smoke. Terrified, she fled the apartment with her …
Continue reading "After fire, all young mother wants is a safe home for three children"
What is independence worth? For Kevin Williams, 43, everything. But Kevin has Type 1 diabetes, which has stolen his kidneys and his eyesight. The disease also killed both his parents within the past year, and left Kevin homeless. You don’t get Type 1 diabetes from eating too many cupcakes. It’s an autoimmune disease that causes …
Continue reading "Can an iPhone hold the key to a blind man’s independence?"
“Now I hug people!” Zoraida Martinez says brightly, leaning over to a visitor to do just that. This is a new thing for her, considering “my old self (thought) hugging was too vulnerable, my soul connecting to your soul.” Who could blame her? This 19-year-old has, since childhood, braved bullying and every imaginable kind of …
Continue reading "Homeless teen determined to make college dream come true"
In a cramped, run-down apartment next to Interstate 95, a cheerful menagerie of stuffed animals keeps watch over 7-year-old Natali Agustin-Gonzalez. The 20 plush toys, most of them teddy bears given to her over the past year by doctors and nurses, are fastened along the top of Natali’s bedroom wall — a strategic spot because, …
Continue reading "Little Natali’s care after brain surgery puts a strain on her family"
Jennifer Cappel holds her sobbing 3-year-old son, Dakota, trying to console him as they wait in a small examination room on the campus of St. Mary’s Medical Center in West Palm Beach. “This is the worst part for me,” the mom says. It’s not her son’s crying she’s talking about. It’s the waiting. These minutes …
Continue reading "Toddler’s leukemia stresses family’s budget … but not their love"
