RE/MAX Agent Nicole Smith Shares Her “My Why”

Agent Nicole Smith, of RE/MAX Trinity II in Texas, shared her powerful story about how she became engaged in the CMN Hospitals program:

I became a miracle maker as my son Liam has been treated at one of our local miracle Network hospitals, Cook Children’s. Liam has multiple teams at the hospital from neurologist, GI, specialty clinics  to oncologists. The treatment he has been provided because of the equipment Cooks has saved his life. It is important for me to give back to a hospital that  has taken care of so  many children in our community.

    Liam was Diagnosed with NF1 at 7 months old NF is a devastating genetic disorder affecting 1 in 3,000 individuals. NF causes tumors to grow throughout the nervous system, and can cause learning disabilities, blindness, deafness, bone abnormalities and brain and spinal tumors. There are currently no effective treatments, nor a cure. Liam spent a week in the ICU with failure to thrive. Liam had multiple weekly appointments for speech ,OT and physical therapy. Liam began to walk a month before his 2nd birthday

    Liam has had 10 sedated MRI’s. They found an optic glioma tumor on his left eye nerve. He became very sick October 14th 2015, within 24 hours he was diagnosed with JMML leukemia, a rare leukemia associated with Neurofibromatosis.

    He had 2 rounds of chemo and had a bone marrow transplant the day before Thanksgiving. Liam had lots of complications though out the process, the transplant was not as smooth as we had been advised, Liam became violently sick and had a bad reaction to the preservative in the stem cells. He got a bacteria “c diff” infection that placed Liam on an even higher isolation for 21 days and more medications Our worst nightmare was the graph vs hostess disease where his body was trying to reject the new cells, he is still currently on steroids for this. 2 weeks before Christmas He was taken down to ICU for VOD ( the blood vessels that transport blood through the liver become inflamed and blocked. This causes the liver to swell. Because of the lack of blood supply, the liver cannot remove toxins, drugs and other waste products from the blood) and had to have a chest tube to drain his lung as that had now became full of fluid. He has had 3 surgeries in two months to get his port, central line and G button. After 4 months of isolation Liam got to come home, only to end up in the ICU within 24 hours with an infection pseudomonas, a bacteria infection is in his blood that we almost lost him to.

    They had him intubated and sedated . Liam has proved all the doctors and odds against him wrong!!! Liam finally came home and we are 2 years in remission!! He receives all treatment at one of our local Children’s Miracle Network hospitals , Cook Children’s.