Madison Matters!

Madison is a 6 year old girl who was born on Father's Day 1999. She was a totally healthy, perfect baby. At the age of 9 weeks, while her Mother was at work, Madison was left in the care of her father. Because she was crying, her father violently shook her and slammed her into her crib. He left her there, with the door closed, for 5 hours. When he checked on her, she was not breathing. He called 9-1-1 and waited. Madison's Mother was on her way home from work and did not know her baby was now fighting for her life. When she pulled into the parking lot of their apartment building, she saw several police cars and an ambulance. As she walked to the door of her home, she was greeted by paramedics running out with a blue and lifeless Madison. Madison was taken to a local hospital and placed on life support. From there she was transported by helicopter to a larger children's hospital in St. Louis. Still on life support, we now learned that this was no mysterious infection, this was trauma. Madison's father gave an excuse that an ashtray had been knocked off a coffee table and hit Madison in the head. Yet, there was not a single mark on her- no bruises, no red marks. Madison was in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit for a total of 13 days. Those first few days we did not know if she would even survive her injuries.

 It took 5 days for her father to admit what he had done.

Madison's injuries are devastating. She has a massive brain injury, is blind, paralyzed from the waist down. Madison had 15-25 seizures a day when she was first injured.She suffers from cerebral palsy and severe scoliosis of her spine. Because she was so young when she had to be put on life support, she lost the instinct that babies have to suck. Therefore, when she was taken off life support, she had "forgotten" how to take a bottle. We could not even feed her. She had to get a feeding tube put into her stomach and is still tube-fed today.

The doctors were very grim about Madison's prognosis. Most of the doctors did not believe she would even survive. She was on life support for 13 days. We were encouraged to take her off of life support and "let her go with dignity". We would not, in fact, we could not give up on Madison. On the 13th day, she was taken off life support with the understanding that if she did not breathe on her own, she would be put back on. To the doctor's amazement, Madison did breathe, and did not need to be on life support again for almost 3 years! (We just knew she would breathe on her own!)

 Her father was arrested and sentenced to 25 years in prison.

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