Hello to all who read this page! This site is dedicated to Amelia Rose Matthews. It exists after 16 weeks in the hospital, 2 years of dialysis and a kidney transplant, not to mention countless clinic visits, blood draws and tests.
We are now letting Amelia live her life, and be as normal a 5 year old as she can be. As a result of her ESRD (End Stage Renal Disease) she qualifies and is going to be granted a Wish from the Make-A-Wish Foundation!
Just to be clear, and to clarify some previously held beliefs, The Make-A Wish foundation grants wishes to children with Life-Threatening diseases. It is not an organization that only grants wishes to dying kids. Many of the wishes that are publicized are from kids with cancer who may be dying, but most of the kids who get their wishes continue to live happy lives! It is a wonderful thing to grant these kids a wish, to let them be or do something that they really want to do but would not be able to do without help. While some of these kids do pass away there are many with life-threatening diseases that make it. The Make-A-Wish Foundation is to celebrate Life!
One nice thing about places like Make-A Wish is that you get to be a community, no a family with these other families who have a similar story or at least can empathize with you. As a result, we all feel it when one of these kids doesn’t make it, and we are all sad for the family.
Now, back to Amelia! If you are here without knowing about Amelia and her story I will give you a brief synopsis. You can go to Carepages.com and read her entire story that was written in near real time with her name ameliarosematthews. (no spaces). Or you can wait for my book to come out with everything in it. By the way, I am Amelia’s Dad, Justin.
So Amelia’s story. It began at the end of April of 2007 when she was 11 months old. She had a seizure and we rushed her to the hospital where it was finally determined that she was in renal failure. She was put in the ICU and started on immediate dialysis to clean out her blood and balance her electrolytes. We then spent all of June, 3 weeks of July and most of August in the hospital. She had surgeries to remover her kidneys, place catheters and try to get her body ready for different types of dialysis.
Eventually it totaled 16 weeks in the hospital. Home dialysis ended in September of 2007 because it was not working. She then spent 2 years on dialysis 4 times per week. We spent 20-24 hours per week with Amelia on dialysis.
Finally, in May of 2009 a donor kidney was found for Amelia and she received her transplant a week before her 3rd birthday. Her new kidney came from a wonderful lady named Carol that we are still in touch with and keep her updated on Amelia.
It has now been 2 1/2 years since the transplant and Amelia is healthy and happy and a fairly normal 5 year old. It is still odd to think that she has a terminal disease and she always will. It is also odd to be receiving a wish for her.
For that wish, Amelia wanted nothing more than to be a Princess. If you didn’t know her you should know she is actually a princess and dresses like one every day. Her wish was to be Rapunzel in the parade at Disney World. They are still working on that, she may not be able to do the parade but she will still be able to have tea with the princesses as Rapunzel. ** ** IMPORTANT UPDATE** Disney World has decided that Amelia WILL be able to be Rapunzel in the parade!!! this is something that has never been done before and we are very excited about it!
And they assure us that she will have a magical experience at Disney World. We are getting excited for the trip. Stay right here for all of the updates about getting ready for the trip and what Amelia is going through and what she is doing. As well as updates on my book. 🙂
Thanks for dropping by, please use the tab at the top or THIS LINK and sign our guestbook, let us know you were here!
There are also pictures from various phases of this whole journey coming as well as some charitable opportunities over there in the left sidebar. If you are feeling charitable, any of those fine organizations would love to have your tax deductible donation. All of those companies have helped our family over this whole ordeal, or will be helping for Amelia’s wish.
Thank you for dropping my, we look forward to your return!
**Now, click here to go to the blog for recent updates!**
Related articles
- Amelias Wish Declaration (ameliasmakeawish.com)
- A Princess Party, A Wish Granted (ameliasmakeawish.com)
- The Make A Wish Journey Begins. (ameliasmakeawish.com)
- A Ballpark Guess of Our Disney Trip (ameliasmakeawish.com)
