Help Support The Friedrich Children
Donation protected
To all my friends and family. My friends, Jay and Kristen, have two beautiful children, William and Evelyn, that have some medical issues. I have known Jay and Kristen for many years and they both have been wonderful friends. He is an IT manager and Kristen is a stay at home mom taking care of her special needs children. They are wonderful parents and good friends. Their childrens' issues have not all been covered by insurance, resulting in over $100,000 in medical bills and debt for their family.
The Friedrich family needs support in their time of need. While pregnant with their daughter, Evelyn, they discovered she had Congenital Hydrocephalus and doctors told them she would likely not make it to birth. She proved to be a strong fighter and they got to meet their wonderful baby girl.
Hydrocephalus is an abnormal accumulation of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) within cavities in the brain called ventricles. It occurs when there is an imbalance between the amount of CSF that is produced and the rate at which it is absorbed. As the CSF builds up, it causes the ventricles to enlarge and the pressure inside the head to increase.
Sadly, her struggle was only beginning. By seven months old, she needed to be rushed into emergency pediatric neurosurgery to install a cerebral shunt to relieve the pressure on her brain. She also developed very serious seizures and had to be put on a costly ($2700/month) medicine that, while it could result in permanent damage her eyesight, would bring the seizures under control over the course of several months. Those seizures and the hydrocephalus led to Evelyn developing Quadriplegic Hypotonic Cerebral Palsy (CP).
Hypotonia is diminished muscle tone. Hypotonic Cerebral Palsy is often the result of severe brain damage or malformations and is a physical disability that affects movement and posture and can result in complications such as additional seizures and intellectual delays. In Evelyn's case, it means she has less muscle tone in all of her limbs which affects her ability to walk, grasp, and other tasks that rely on motor control or muscle tone.
While all that was going on, their young son, William, had stopped talking, stopped eating, and began experiencing chronic pain in his joints. It took them over a year of medical trial and error: speech therapy, feeding clinics, GI surgery, occupational therapy, and others, along with dozens of different doctors and specialist and some rather large medical bills (in the tens of thousands) to get to a diagnosis. William has Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS) and is on the Autism Spectrum.
Ehlers-Danlos syndrome is a group of disorders that affect connective tissues supporting the skin, bones, blood vessels, eyes, and many other organs and tissues. Defects in connective tissues cause the signs and symptoms of these conditions, which range from mildly loose joints to life-threatening complications; such as easy bruising and scarring, joint dislocation, rupture in major blood vessels and others. There is no cure for EDS, but it can be treated.
Doctors also strongly recommend William begin Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA) treatment for his autism and leg braces for his EDS. Evelyn requires leg and hand braces for her Hypotonic Cerebral Palsy. Both kids have been fighting throughout all of this, and have done amazingly well with treatment. Better than their parents dared to hope for. They’ve been in and out of hospitals the entirety of their young lives: 5 ER visits, 6 times being admitted for long term care, 3 CT scans, 7 MRI’s, 4 long-term EEG studies, and 9 series of X-Rays just for baby Evelyn before she was even 18 months old, and William has been to the ER multiple times for dislocations and other issues related to his EDS. Within the near future, Evelyn will also need to undergo another brain surgery for a shunt revision, as she outgrows her current shunt or it fails (they almost always do, sooner or later). After William was diagnosed with Autism they discovered their health insurance would not cover any of his treatment related to his autism, leaving them to pay tens of thousands of dollars in medical bills completely out of pocket.
William and Evelyn require treatment several times a week with occupational therapy, speech therapy, and physical therapy. Their mother, Kristen has had to put off returning to work indefinitely to care for their children, as they couldn’t possibly afford to pay for their children’s care if they didn’t take a large portion of it on themselves. They have also had to cease their own healthcare for their own medical issues (they both also have EDS) to keep their medical costs down as much as possible.
They are left with a mountain of medical debt and both of their children have a long struggle ahead of them. They need your help! Your donations will be used to help them reduce or pay off their medical debts and get these wonderful and fiercely strong young children access to the treatments and procedures they need to thrive.
The Friedrich family needs support in their time of need. While pregnant with their daughter, Evelyn, they discovered she had Congenital Hydrocephalus and doctors told them she would likely not make it to birth. She proved to be a strong fighter and they got to meet their wonderful baby girl.
Hydrocephalus is an abnormal accumulation of cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) within cavities in the brain called ventricles. It occurs when there is an imbalance between the amount of CSF that is produced and the rate at which it is absorbed. As the CSF builds up, it causes the ventricles to enlarge and the pressure inside the head to increase.
Sadly, her struggle was only beginning. By seven months old, she needed to be rushed into emergency pediatric neurosurgery to install a cerebral shunt to relieve the pressure on her brain. She also developed very serious seizures and had to be put on a costly ($2700/month) medicine that, while it could result in permanent damage her eyesight, would bring the seizures under control over the course of several months. Those seizures and the hydrocephalus led to Evelyn developing Quadriplegic Hypotonic Cerebral Palsy (CP).
Hypotonia is diminished muscle tone. Hypotonic Cerebral Palsy is often the result of severe brain damage or malformations and is a physical disability that affects movement and posture and can result in complications such as additional seizures and intellectual delays. In Evelyn's case, it means she has less muscle tone in all of her limbs which affects her ability to walk, grasp, and other tasks that rely on motor control or muscle tone.
While all that was going on, their young son, William, had stopped talking, stopped eating, and began experiencing chronic pain in his joints. It took them over a year of medical trial and error: speech therapy, feeding clinics, GI surgery, occupational therapy, and others, along with dozens of different doctors and specialist and some rather large medical bills (in the tens of thousands) to get to a diagnosis. William has Ehlers-Danlos Syndrome (EDS) and is on the Autism Spectrum.
Ehlers-Danlos syndrome is a group of disorders that affect connective tissues supporting the skin, bones, blood vessels, eyes, and many other organs and tissues. Defects in connective tissues cause the signs and symptoms of these conditions, which range from mildly loose joints to life-threatening complications; such as easy bruising and scarring, joint dislocation, rupture in major blood vessels and others. There is no cure for EDS, but it can be treated.
Doctors also strongly recommend William begin Applied Behavioral Analysis (ABA) treatment for his autism and leg braces for his EDS. Evelyn requires leg and hand braces for her Hypotonic Cerebral Palsy. Both kids have been fighting throughout all of this, and have done amazingly well with treatment. Better than their parents dared to hope for. They’ve been in and out of hospitals the entirety of their young lives: 5 ER visits, 6 times being admitted for long term care, 3 CT scans, 7 MRI’s, 4 long-term EEG studies, and 9 series of X-Rays just for baby Evelyn before she was even 18 months old, and William has been to the ER multiple times for dislocations and other issues related to his EDS. Within the near future, Evelyn will also need to undergo another brain surgery for a shunt revision, as she outgrows her current shunt or it fails (they almost always do, sooner or later). After William was diagnosed with Autism they discovered their health insurance would not cover any of his treatment related to his autism, leaving them to pay tens of thousands of dollars in medical bills completely out of pocket.
William and Evelyn require treatment several times a week with occupational therapy, speech therapy, and physical therapy. Their mother, Kristen has had to put off returning to work indefinitely to care for their children, as they couldn’t possibly afford to pay for their children’s care if they didn’t take a large portion of it on themselves. They have also had to cease their own healthcare for their own medical issues (they both also have EDS) to keep their medical costs down as much as possible.
They are left with a mountain of medical debt and both of their children have a long struggle ahead of them. They need your help! Your donations will be used to help them reduce or pay off their medical debts and get these wonderful and fiercely strong young children access to the treatments and procedures they need to thrive.
Organiser and beneficiary
Tito Vela
Organiser
Chicago, IL
Jay Friedrich
Beneficiary