GRAND RAPIDS, Mich. — Nine-year-old Lauryn Scott loves playing with her princess dolls. But for her, life has been far from a fairy tale.
“The day I had her, she had visible veins popping out of her whole body and her face,” recalls Lauryn’s mother, Angela Scott. “Thank goodness, it was a doctor that was there that saw her and knew instantly what her defect was.”
Lauryn had Tetralogy of Fallot with VSD, a combination of four congenital heart defects. She also had a hole in her heart.
“So with finding that they actually didn't close the hole, they found out she had different macros in her body and her organs wasn't all the way developed,” explains Angela, who says her daughter has had more than 12 open-heart surgeries since birth, all unexpected.
“It was totally life changing for sure,” says Angela. “I had to stop work for two years. Everything was just unexpected. We lived in a Ronald McDonald House in Ann Arbor for the first five months of her life.”
Now, Lauryn continues to deal with heart issues, most recently in January. Causing her parents to drop everything and head to University of Michigan’s Children’s Hospital in Ann Arbor. Those stays often last for weeks up until months, adding a financial strain to an already emotional roller coaster.
“We’ve pretty much exhausted our savings account,” says Angela. “Everything that her medical and everything is paid for, but us not being able to work every time she goes to the hospital… And then we never know if she gets sick, but we have to take off for work.”
Despite many challenges, Lauryn is just like any other kid, full of life and hopeful for the future.
“The most beautiful thing about her is that she keeps us smiling, so happy and just by looking at her,” says Angela. “You couldn't tell anything's wrong with her.”
If you would like to help the family with Lauryn's recovery, you can donate to their GoFundMe page.
