Our beautiful Sophie was born at 4:23 a.m. on July 4, 2003, in Cincinnati, OH. Labor was not easy...23 hours with 2 ½ hours of pushing, but Sophie was perfect in every way. She spent the first 30 minutes of life not crying, but looking around and taking everything in. We remember our first night in the hospital together, hearing fireworks outside, and thinking how neat it would be for Sophie to have fireworks on each of her birthdays for the rest of her life.
Sophie was the first for everyone. She was our first child and was the first grandchild. She brought so much joy to so many people. For us, our lives changed forever the day she was born. We knew we were going to dedicate every waking hour to ensure Sophie had the absolute best environment in which to grow, learn, and flourish.
For Sophie’s grandparents, Sophie was someone they could spoil and love all over again. She loved playing and swimming at “Grandpa’s cottage.” She loved the countless care packages Grandma sent in the mail. She loved messing up Papa’s hair and playing dishes with Nana. Sophie was always a special kid. We know all parents think their child is special, but Sophie was different. She reached all the usual milestones before or on time. By ten months she was sitting still, listening to long stories and then was able to identify all the objects in the stories. By one year, she could identify all shapes, including pentagon, hexagon, and octagon. Once she learned how to walk and communicate, we learned how sweet, kind, and smart she really was. At 18 months, she knew all her letters and could say and spell her name.
The diagnosis and prognosis crushed us. We could not understand why our little girl had this mean and evil monster growing in her head. We kept asking ourselves, “How long has it been there?” and “Why us?” and “What did we do wrong?” We started to think about the signs which probably existed as far back as September of 2006. It started out.....
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