Mother appeals for financial assistance for paraplegic daughter

Sep 01, 2008 News

STANLEYTOWN, NEW AMSTERDAM – Being confined to a wheel chair for three years was like having her youth snatched away from her.

Nicola Blades and her mother, Claudette Blades.

Twenty-one-year-old Nicola Blades, of Lot 31 Stanleytown, New Amsterdam, suffered a sudden inability to walk in 2005; and three years later, she still cannot walk.

According to a medical document from a private hospital in the city, she had no previous history of this condition.

The medical document stated that, prior to her inability to walk, there was a rapid abnormality in her walk. Now, there is sensory sensation in the lower limbs, but there is no motor activity. The findings of an MRI in 2007 showed, after a T2W screening of the thoracic spine, that the posterior epidural at T4, T5 and T6 levels elevated the posterior ligament (ligamentum flavum) with possible collection/mass.

The document also suggested that there may be an indural mass like meningioma.
On May 8 this year, the Internal Medicine Department of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation presented the family with a medical report which states, inter alia, that Nicola is suffering from weakness of lower limbs. She has been referred for surgical treatment overseas.

Against this backdrop, the family is appealing for assistance in giving Nicola a second chance at life. “I cannot afford to go to Trinidad, and we have to go on October 7 this year, and we are poor people. I am a single parent …her father is not with us. I am pleading with persons to assist in giving my daughter a chance to walk again. The doctor is claiming that there is a tumor in the spine.” said Claudette Blades, her mother.

The mother explained that Nicola attended school up to the secondary level. She was just the average teen when her dilemma struck. “She first started complaining that the foot was getting stiff – the right foot – I used to rub it with coconut oil because I thought it was a cold.”

The woman said that Nicola then started losing her balance and would fall frequently. “I took her to a bone specialist and we did several x-rays, but nothing was found. She was transferred to the medical clinic, and again nothing was found, and she was referred to the Georgetown Hospital. They found nothing again, and we took her to several private doctors in Georgetown for two years, and they did not see anything. I took her back to the Georgetown Hospital in 2006, and subsequently she was admitted to the Georgetown Hospital, where she spent two months. I took my own discharge and took her to a private doctor, then he requested the MRI.”

That was when the discovery was made, “That doctor was trying to get doctors in Jamaica to help her, but was not successful.”

After several trips to different doctors, the recommendation was made for Nicola to undergo a surgical procedure in Trinidad.

“They told us that she will be able to walk again, because the feet still have life. She still has feelings in the feet, but she just cannot stand on them or walk. I believe that if my daughter gets help, she will walk again.”
Her mother described her as a “very quiet girl, she likes to smile and is such a loving child. She is my only girl and the younger one of two children.

It is hard watching her suffer like this. She does not feel pain all the time, expect if she sits all day. She has to lie flat on the floor and she would pull herself around. I cry a lot when I think of what has happened to her, and she would tell me ‘don’t cry; don’t take on,’ that she will walk again.” With help, we try to hold her up, but she cannot make it at all. We have to do everything for her.”

The quiet spoken young lady shyly said, “I feel sad that they have to do everything for me. Everybody got to do everything for me. I like my privacy, and now I don’t get any privacy. I cry a lot every time I think of what has happened. Sometimes, when I am at home alone and I see people going out, and knowing that I cannot go out, I cry. What happened to me was really not fair.”

Before this all began, she led a normal life. “Life was nice for me, and life was good for me. Now, I have lost all my friends, and they don’t come to see me or call me on the phone. Many of them would only call me on the phone if they want something.”

Fighting back the tears and in a barely audible voice, she mumbled, “Before this, I had a lot of friends. Now I ain’t got any. I feel shame when I see people, especially the friends I used to have. Some of them, when they see me in the wheelchair they would laugh and walk away. How could that be? It hurts me so badly, it makes me sadder.”

What does the future hold for Nicola? “I think that it does not hold anything for me, because if I cannot walk, there is nothing for me. If anything happens to my mother or grandmother, it means that I would no longer exist. They are the ones who take me through this all. I am like a baby once again, except that I can talk and I am intelligent. The future seems very bleak for me. Please help me. My family cannot afford the cost for my surgery overseas, air fare, accommodation and all that goes with it. My mother sells in the market.”

Nicola explained that she tries to exercise the feet, but with no luck. “Sometimes, I get pain in the back, and it is really bad.”

She had big plans for her adult life. “I wanted to become a teacher. I do not know if I can still do it, but I am willing to try. I spend a lot of time praying, reading, watching television and listening to music. Life is just different now.”

However, she relates that there is an upside to it all. “This has brought me closer to God. I pray a lot and spend much more time reading the Bible. I go to church. I know that God will see me through this, and it is not the end of the world. I will survive and come out of this a stronger and better person, with the help of God.”

Persons interested in assisting Nicola can contact the family on 333-3850, 683-7312 and 682-1808.