NOV 2009 UPDATE ON DENIS' SURGERY

Denis came through the surgery with flying colors! Doctors were able to straighten his spine, stretch his ribs and insert rods and screws to keep his spine properly aligned. It is absolutely amazing!

He was off of the ventilator quickly and was able to wiggle his toes in the recovery room. His Mom spent the night in ICU with him and she is ecstatic! I could hear the joy in her voice when we spoke on the telephone. Now begins the recovery, physical therapy and healing. Thank you, one and all, for your prayers. Please keep them coming as this boy still has a way to go, enduring the pain and learning to move all over again.

In our last Peaceletter, we told you about Denis, a 12-year-old boy with the most severe case of Scoliosis we’ve ever seen. He’s a shy, respectful boy who lives in constant pain.

His father died in the aftermath of the Bosnian war when Denis was only four months old. His mother, Munira, has struggled to provide for Denis and his siblings with no income and a mound of medical bills.

The only medical treatment Denis has been given has come in the form of a very uncomfortable, molded plastic brace that has had to be replaced as he has grown. The brace has not helped at all and, in fact, has made his condition worse. Now the situation is life-threatening and time is of the essence!   

Denis’s spine is pushing into his heart and lungs! If he does not have surgery, his spine will continue to invade his vital organs until the condition takes his life! The doctors in Bosnia have told Munira that there is nothing more they can do.

We sat down with Munira and Denis during our last pilgrimage. Munira cried while Denis just looked at the ground. We will never forget that woeful mother’s plea: “Can you help my son?” When we returned home, we learned that there are only a few hospitals right here in our own country where this complex surgery can be performed. One of them is Wolfson’s Children’s Hospital in Jacksonville, the same hospital where little Fadila’s open heart surgery was performed. That was the good news. The bad news was that, unlike the Patrons of the Hearts Program, the hospital has no programs to assist with surgery of this kind.

Enter our Guardian Angel, Dr. Danielle (Saunders) Walsh, a pediatric surgeon at Wolfson’s. When she showed Denis’s x-rays to the orthopedic surgeons there, they agreed that Denis’s life is in jeopardy. They also agreed to help him!

Our challenge now is to handle the costs involved in getting passports, visas, airline tickets and funds to cover other expenses for the eight weeks that Denis and Munira will have to stay in Florida. By comparison to what Dr. Walsh has accomplished, this is small potatoes. But it’s still a lot of money! And we need it yesterday!

We don’t know why the Lord and His holy Mother continue to place children with life-threatening illnesses in our pathway—children who, otherwise, would remain isolated and unknown in a country where they have limited medical care and no hope for survival. Maybe it’s because they know we have such a deep love for children. Maybe it’s because they know we have an incredible group of caring people who continue to make sacrifices so that these children might live.

Sometimes, I wonder if this isn’t one of the reasons why Our Lady chose Medjugorje. Through her apparitions, she drew us there and, step by step, she’s placed these children before us, providing all of us with this incredible opportunity to love, to sacrifice, to save the lives of children.