Today, my post is about a very special girl whose birthday
happens to be today!
Blanca has one of the strongest personalities that I’ve had
the pleasure of meeting at the Hogar.
Initially, Blanca was very shy with me because I was new to her life,
but this was very misleading. Her
personality and attitude toward me completely changed after just a couple days
and now I am happy to say that Blanca and I are friends.
Blanca suffers from a muscular disease that has left her
without use of her legs and with very limited use of her hands. She is completely wheelchair bound and often
requires people to carry her up the stairs and take her around the house. Despite her limited abilities, Blanca has
been through years of physical therapy which has paid off quite a bit. When she first arrived at the home, Blanca
had very limited use of any part of her body.
It was quite difficult for her to move her head around or lift her chest
up off the ground if she happened to slump down or fall over. Now, her therapy has helped her to strengthen
the muscles of her trunk and she now has very good mobility of her chest and
spine. She is able to shift herself
around, lay forward on the ground, pick herself up, and she even has some
strength back in her arms so that she can maneuver things put in her hands.
Almost every day, I feed Blanca lunch or dinner downstairs
so that she can be with the rest of the children her age. She is notorious among the volunteers for
being a slow eater as she chews her each bite of food for about 3 minutes, and
is even known to spit it back into the bowl.
Blanca does have some independence and will chomp down on the side of a
cup, lift it up over her head, and drink juice or water on her own. Regardless of her disease, she is a fairly
independent (and sometimes bossy) girl.
She loves to draw in the coloring books and will often make me flip through
the entire book until I find a game of tic-tac-toe for us to play. But I would say her favorite pastime would be
taking selfies of herself on my phone.
Today when I walked into the house, I looked over to see
Blanca smiling ear to ear with her floral bunny ear headband and it also
brought a smile to my face. Another
volunteer, Lotti, and I decided to walk Blanca around the neighborhood and take
her to the park as a little birthday treat.
I think Blanca is one of the strongest, most resilient, and spirited
children in the house.
- Nicole
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