Why am I always awake at 3am in the morning???

It is because I love my daughter Tori so much that it hurts. It hurts every second, every minute, every hour of every day. Often there are tears as wonderful memories fill my mind and I think of all of those dreams that could have, should have been for Tori and our family. But harsh reality always sets in and my mind shifts to the present and the never ending drive for knowledge. Knowledge to help bring Tori back to us all. Knowledge to help give Tori a better quality of life. Knowledge to help Tori in any humanly possible way. So mostly I research and learn as to gain that knowledge and I am definitely not alone. There are thousands of others out there doing the same for their loved ones who are in similar positions. Each one reading information on medical research, on medications, on assistive technologies, on therapies and alternative therapies, on basically anything and everything to help their loved ones. I spend most of my time doing the same while conversing and learning directly with the thousands of others in numerous online groups and newsgroups, through other people's personal websites that are like http://www.pray4tori.com and so on. It is a never ending struggle for all of us and the challenges are certainly shared. Inspiration, strength and love abounds and without this support I honestly have no idea where we would be right now...

So early this morning I thought I would share with all of you an update I found tonight on my friend Dave's website. He summarizes our lives in his very straightforward and honest fashion and this just happened to have had an impact on me very early this morning. Dave's son Michael is also a near drowning survivor and I would encourage everyone to read about Michael's tragic and unfortunate story. Kid's, please make smart choices and don't succumb to peer pressure and parent's, please educate and advise your kid's accordingly.

Thank you,

-Tim

From the September 13th Daily Update on http://www.justiceformichael.com

September 13, 2006

Unless you have lost a child or your child suffers brain damage, you will never understand what it does to you emotionally. Check out the Yahoo Group 'Parents of Near Drowns', to get an idea of what it does to people's lives. It affects every aspect of your life. Unless you are in my shoes, you cannot even begin to comprehend what I have lost. You have no idea what Michael means to me. He is everything to me, there is nothing that I won't do to help him. I take care of him and ensure that he stays physically healthy because I cannot imagine my life without him. Keeping him alive keeps me alive.

I have done every single thing I can think of and he has not shown much improvement; my patience is gone. I work 9 hours a day, when I come home I take care of him, research ways to help him , I am constantly making home modifications to make things easier for us and I think constantly of ways to stimulate him. When I wake up in the early morning hours, my thoughts are of him. Helping him has consumed my life; as it would anyone else in this situation. He will get better or I will die trying.

Stem cells treatments are the only thing that will help Michael. I wish I could get it done in the US, but we are too righteous and ethical to do aggressive research, therefore I have to go outside of the country. Do I trust the Chinese? I trust them more than I trust Americans. There were no Chinese people at the beach the day that Michael died. I don't remember a single Chinese person providing alcohol to my son. I damn sure don't recall any people from China destroying our lives. If memory serves, they were all Americans.

Michael will get stem cell treatments. If the treatment works, I will be extremely grateful. If it doesn't work, then at least I tried to give him some quality of life. I will do whatever it takes, period.

Take care,

Dave