A mom hopes—and works—for a miracle

Jennifer Scallan had just gotten off the phone with her then-16-year-old daughter Kayla Smith and drifted off to sleep. It was the Fourth of July, 2007, and Kayla was watching the fireworks on the Mississippi River levee with some friends, living the life of a normal teenager. Mere minutes later, one of Kayla’s friends called back to tell Jennifer the most devastating news of her life: “Kayla’s been shot.”

“I can still hear the words echoing in my mind,” Scallan remembers.

Kayla had been walking back to the car when a bullet meant for someone else hit her in the abdomen. Another struck a second bystander, 21-year-old Robert Blunschi Jr., in the head. Neither was the intended target, yet Kayla’s life now hung in the balance.

“I immediately felt myself crumble with fear and disbelief—like a bad dream,” Scallan says. “I just kept thinking . . . she’s gonna die.”

Scallan and her husband jumped into the car and headed to Our Lady of the Lake, not even sure whether that was where Kayla had been taken. But Kayla was there, and her situation was dire.

“Kayla was hemorrhaging,” Scallan says. “She didn’t look good. Before the surgery, all the nurses were looking down; we thought Kayla wouldn’t make it.”

Fortunately, Kayla lived. She had been shot in the abdomen and the bullet went clean through, but not before puncturing her kidney, liver, small intestine and diaphragm. Kayla’s family agonized as surgeons operated for three and a half hours. Eventually the doctors came out and told Scallan her daughter would pull through.

But there was bad news: the bullet had also struck Kayla’s spinal cord, paralyzing her from her thighs down. “I was in shock for a long time,” Scallan says. “You go through different stages—anger, shock, disbelief.”

Once Kayla had recovered enough from the surgery, she was flown to Chicago to Shriner’s Hospital, which specializes in spinal cord injuries. Scallan and her daughter stayed there for “40 days and 40 nights,” says Scallan. From there, they went to Touro Infirmary in New Orleans for Kayla’s longer-term recovery and rehabilitation.

The care at both places was fine, Scallan says, but the staffs at both facilities primarily focused on simply teaching Kayla to adapt to life in a wheelchair; they didn’t encourage her to be hopeful.

Scallan wanted more than that strictly medical approach. “I’ve talked to other parents, and they say the same thing: You can’t promise anybody that they will walk again, but you should at least give them hope.”

Kayla’s transition proved daunting. “It is a very difficult lifestyle,” Kayla says. “You realize how much you needed whatever is now paralyzed.” She lost her bladder and bowel functions, obviously a major problem that takes its toll both physically and emotionally—not just on her, but also on those who care for her.

Even little things, like rain, pose big problems. Since very few buildings are totally handicapped-accessible with covered driveways, by the time she maneuvers from car to wheelchair, Kayla finds herself soaked. This makes going to school or even doctor’s appointments difficult. “When it’s raining, getting in and out of the car and getting from place to place can be very exhausting,” Kayla admits.

A spinal cord-injury victim has to learn how to strike a delicate balance between hope and how to cope. But sometimes, hope can pay off, says Gregory M. Holmes, an associate professor with the Neurotrauma and Nutrition Laboratory at Pennington Biomedical Research Center.

“Science and medicine have not reached the point where we can make spinal cord-injury victims fully functional again,” Holmes says. “But there are ways to get them to adapt so they can be better than what they were right after the accident. It’s entirely dependent on the individual. But it’s important to remember that any improvement can be perceived as a victory.”

Today, Kayla can walk with braces and a walker. Initially, doctors said her spinal cord had been completely severed; they were mistaken. Now, Scallan believes the fact that Kayla’s spinal cord is partially intact is a miracle, which fuels her motherly hope.

“All that is promising,” Scallan says. She’s done so much reading and research on the subject of spinal cord injuries that she can sound like an expert herself. “As long as the spinal cord is intact, the brain can find a new neuropathic pathway; it can re-route itself,” she says. “The whole idea is to replace damaged nerves with good nerves. That’s where stem cells come in.”

And hope.

Scallan has organized a fundraiser for Kayla to pay for a stem-cell transplant using cord blood. No such procedure has received U.S. approval, so they’ll likely have to travel to Costa Rica. Doctors there would intravenously administer stem cells that would seek out Kayla’s injured spinal cord and repair it.

“And the stem cells know where to go,” Scallan says. “God made our bodies,” she says, “and He designed stem cells to go to the site of the injury.”

But as with any procedure not yet widely accepted, there are no guarantees, and certainly there remain unanswered questions.

“No one has been able to explain how stem cells know where to go,” says Terri Turner-Marse, executive director of the LifeShare Cord Blood Bank. “The stem cells just know.” The stem cells contained in cord blood are being used and studied for a variety of disease applications. Because of the immaturity of the stem cells present, the degree of matching between donor and recipient is not as stringent as it is with organs and bone marrow transplants. Patients are more likely to find a match with cord blood stem cells.

The procedure they hope Kayla receives, although not now performed in the United States, does not involve embryonic stem cells.

“The future is bright for the application of stem cells to spinal cord injury,” Turner-Marse adds.

Scallan is hopeful that the stem-cell procedure will be the vehicle that God uses to help her daughter walk again: “I believe He performs miracles through medicine,” she says.

Determined to do whatever it takes to see Kayla healed, Scallan has channeled the agony of her daughter’s tragedy into energy to fight for her daughter’s cause. She has been in the local news often, for everything from charity events in Kayla’s name to working with the courts to bring the shooters to justice.

Before the accident, Kayla was a cheerleader, danced for years at a local studio and played sports. And though the accident took precious years of her youth, Kayla keeps fighting to regain her independence. Now 20, Kayla goes to Baton Rouge Community College and has her own apartment, though it’s not easy. “Everyday routines are accomplished by using my hands, which makes everything more difficult,” Kayla says.

Nevertheless, Kayla has turned even that difficulty into a blessing by rediscovering a talent dormant for far too long: her art. “After the accident, I realized God blessed me with the gift of working well with my hands. I found an appreciation and passion for art that I never had before. It is also the only way I could cope with the emotions I had toward the pain—physically and emotionally—that came with this accident.”

Neither Kayla nor Scallan shows signs of quitting. “I look at it like this,” Scallan says. “If I give up, Kayla may never walk again. But if I keep moving in a positive direction, she may very well have a chance to walk again.”

Dr. Holmes reiterates this thinking. “There tend to be two types of victims: Those who give up and those who can be perceived as being ‘overly optimistic.’ The ‘overly optimistic’ ones may be trying to pursue these avenues that don’t work out. And there’s no guarantee that any intervention is going to work. But there IS a guarantee that doing nothing gets you nothing. If you try something, who knows what can happen? Even if you don’t hit your intended target, you may improve other parts that weren’t a part of your initial goal. ”

Optimistic. That’s a good way to describe Scallan’s approach to Kayla’s recovery. “I’ve been Kayla’s backbone,” Scallan admits. “When I’ve been really, really down, she’s picked me up, and whenever she’s been really, really down, I’ve picked her up. We lean on each other.”

Kayla, ever the cheerleader, keeps a positive attitude as well. “You start cherishing all the simple pleasures life has given you. This kind of thing helps you see what’s really important, and it helps you grow into a better person.”

Scallan has dreams of her daughter being healed, which she firmly believes will come true. “I have a lot of faith that Kayla’s gonna walk again. It can definitely happen. I keep my eyes on Jesus; I keep my eyes on God. I keep my faith.”

Make donations at any Hancock Bank to: Kayla Smith Medical Benefit Fund.

For more information on spinal cord injuries, you can check out these websites:

christopherreeve.org

asia-spinalinjury.org