Thank You to my fellow members at Tarrytown United Methodist Church,
I am a member of the Wesley Sunday School class. One of our class goals for 2009 is to give financial support to several worthy causes in Austin that go beyond the needs of our church. Earlier this year I suggested helping a special needs child named Cody, who was last fitted for his wheel chair at age seven. He is now fourteen and outgrew his wheel chair several years ago. A new wheelchair for Cody is $6,400. And that is non motorized. The company that makes the non powered wheelchairs custom makes them for each patient. They cut all the metal pieces to an exact size after taking the patient's body measurements. The family currently has their home on the market and they hope to have the funds to buy Cody a new wheelchair when their home sells.
I know Cody through my daughter, Ruth, who is fourteen and also has special needs. I met Cody and his family several years ago and have watched them struggle with daily challenges far greater than you would even imagine. Cody cannot walk and has very limited use of his hands and arms. He needs to be fed and can only make sounds mostly. Words are a struggle. He has a beautiful laugh and smile when he has a good day. Cody has a twin brother Casey who attends regular school classes. The hospital bill when the twins were born in 1995 was over $500,000 because the boys had cerebral palsy during pregnancy. Cody recently had an implant placed into his chest to help control his seizures since they were becoming more frequent. I wrote a story about the twins which I named “Cody’s Beautiful Smile”. After our class heard the story of Cody, they voted to support a fundraiser for him with a very nice donation toward the $6,400 needed for a new wheel chair.
I was so overwhelmed by your support that you motivated me to contact each adult Sunday School class at TUMC to request their consideration in supporting this very worthy cause. I also asked that you mention it to other church members as a possibility for donations from individual members. You have responded and we now have over half of the $6,400 raised for Cody’s new wheel chair.
As the donations poured in we forwarded the dollars to Cody’s family. They were so excited that they ordered the wheel chair and it arrived on July 15, 2009. We continue spreading the word and will not stop until we have reached the $6,400 goal. And now check out the Video and share the excitement of Cody moving from his “seven year old wheel chair” . . . where he was all squashed up and did not have easy movement of his arms, shoulders and head . . . into his new custom-made wheel chair with burnt orange fittings on the frame and his name monogrammed in the seat back in Longhorn orange. It tilts back so Cody can see the world and the world can see him. He no longer has to look down at his own lap. The wheels are much larger and the hope is that one day he will be able to self propel it.
A local non profit {sec. 501(c)(3) corporation} by the name of Partners in Affordable Housing, Inc., of which I am the President, assisted in the fund raising. This need qualifies within the parameters of our Mission Statement, which is the following:
Mission Statement
To build and sell homes below cost to qualified low income families and disaster victim families, and to provide loans for these families at below market interest rate, with special emphasis on families having children with Autism, Down Syndrome, and other special needs. To assist qualified families with medical, therapy, and recreational expenses for their Special Needs children. And to assist our community in fundraising projects which are for the benefit of families to help them. meet their affordable living needs.
And again, Thank You to my fellow members at Tarrytown United Methodist Church,
. . . . . from Eli Apolzon and Ruth