roma is now seeing the amazing and inspiring acupuncturist michael mcculoch at the pine street clinic. pictured giving roma the dog joy here is ming – one of the dogs that “works” and hands out love at the clinic.
the team celebrated july 4th festivities in bolinas. cheering on the tug-of-war across the lagoon, watching the parade with friends and taking an independence day plunge in the pacific! our dear friend jeremy helped roma get her feet wet in the ocean for the first time since her surgery…
here are some photos from the recent aquatic therapy associates fundraiser. fun had by all and money raised for the fantastic folks at ATA who provide roma with amazing and effective aquatic physical therapy. incredible how well roma can walk and swim in the water! gravity can be so annoying sometimes can’t it?
fabulous hat, yes?
with laurel, roma’s personal PT and caryl the tireless executive director of ATA
roma and julie having some laughs and fun in the water!
hello dear friends,
can you believe it has been 2 years? we can’t either!
so much has happened to change all of our lives. in the dictionary next to the word “determination” there is the picture of roma jean smith. no one predicted this outcome from that fateful day two years ago today. the doctors said roma would be back to work in 8-10 weeks. little did she know that she would be embarking on the path of a lifetime – quite a new and more difficult type of “work”.
with dogged perseverance, roma moves through her weekly regimen of land & water physical therapy 5x a week, acupuncture 3x a week and chiropractic 3x a week. she takes her new “job” seriously and is resolute in the F A C T that she will walk again.
all of this does not happen in a vacuum. you all have been there by her side from the beginning and it is with this foundation of support that she has the fortitude to carry on. the path of “re-mapping” the brain is long and often difficult to navigate. one of roma’s heroes is jill bolte taylor. some of you may have read her book “My Stroke of Insight” or seen her incredible presentation at TED [click here to see it] or on oprah [click here to see it]. she is a brain scientist who had a stroke and eight years later, through incredible hard work, has recovered and become a powerful voice for brain recovery. roma knows that if jill can do it, so can she, with a lot of hard work and the support of her “village”.
this is where you all come in. please keep roma in your daily thoughts, meditations, prayers – they all work. send her continued strength and positivity. and if you have the ability to help out financially that is also a godsend. unfortunately, all of the doctors, therapies, and treatments add up and until roma can get back to her previous job of healing others she is in need of help from you.
for those who would like to sign up to donate now you can click here and go to our teamroma website. if you have the ability to support roma with a sustaining donation [thank you!] please make sure to schedule your monthly payment date early in the month. we have discovered that paypal is not intuitive enough to make your payment on the 31st of the month if the month happens to end on the 28th. bummer, but hey, that’s paypal, secure and relatively easy to work with.
all donations are tax deductible through our friends at sacred stream. if you have any questions or if you would like to send roma an email, you can click here, and snail mail can be sent here: po box 366 fairfax ca 94978.
we are trying to keep the blog more up to date with photos and developments, so please also keep checking in. there is a really cool video up right now of roma walking virtually on her own with the “up N go” walker!
and we truly cannot repeat this enough:
roma and the rest of us at teamroma want to deeply thank all of you for your amazing support over these past two years. we literally could not do this without you.
it takes a village and we are so blessed to have you in ours.
gratefully yours,
roma & the team
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