This story begins on Nov 6th 2010. Ava was a healthy and intelligent little girl. She had turned 4 less than a month before. She had gone to her yearly check up a few weeks before and everything was fine. The day of the 6 th Ava had complained of a headache and dizziness and her pediatrician had said perhaps it was vertigo from an ear infection. At 2 am on the 7th Ava started to mumble, whine and throw up. She was touching the side of her head and shortly after she passed out her eyes rolling back. We thought she was having a seizure so we called 911 and we realized very quickly something was terribly wrong. She was entubated and the ER doctors and nurses surrounded her and worked very hard to stabilize her, and finally they came to tell us that she had a hemorrhage and they could see a tumor in her brain. They airlifted her to CHOP and there they gave us the worst news of all. IT was inoperable, and in a very delicate spot (the brain stem) they said nothing could be done. The prognosis was bad but the hemorrhage was the biggest thread at the time, they did not know if she could make it 24 hours. A few days later Ava started breathing on her own and was taken out of the PICU and slowly Ava came out of the coma after weeks. She started recovering her movement on the left side, but she was paralyzed in the right side of her body. She started making sounds and saying “ma”. In the past year, Ava has gone back to the old Ava; she is walking with assistance, speaking clearly and playing. In July we had a setback when she relapsed and her tumor grew 20 percent in one month. At the time they told us to go home “and get ready” we never lost hope and prayed very hard and WE witnessed our second miracle, with the help of our mighty King her tumor shrunk without treatment, 2 weeks later. Since then she was put on an experimental drug that kept her tumor stable (or perhaps it wasn’t the drug at all) and in NOV the MRI showed shrinkage. Praise GOD! At 13 months of diagnoses and having beat all the odds Ava is still going strong. If you are a parent of child with DIPG, our humblest advice is turn to GOD. Put your trust in HIM not the DRs. He is the only one that CAN, and he will. This is not his will or a lesson. He loves you and your child and he will deliver you.

 $1,000 Donated to Ava’s family to help with the ongoing cost of copays, treatments and other associated costs.