Personal Stories of Hope Volume 1 | Page 8

ben We are delighted to introduce you to our son, Benjamin. He is absolutely one of the happiest kids you’ll ever meet – he brings joy through his infectious smile to everyone he meets. When Ben was born, on August 25, 1994, we noticed the birthmark on his face. It was only a few hours after his birth we noticed it actually covered over 80% of his body. In addition, the right side of his body was significantly larger than his left side – you could almost draw a line down the center of his body. At that time, of course, we didn’t know the journey we had just begun. We spent the next few months undergoing all sorts of tests to get to a diagnosis – what was going on with our little boy? We saw neurologists, geneticists, and radiologists (Ben’s kidney on his “larger” side was also larger than the kidney on the “smaller” side). At the age of 2.5 months Ben underwent a bone marrow extraction