Miracle for a Noble

Western Bureau:

When Tamara Noble seriously injured her spine in a traffic accident eight years ago, the medical prognosis was that she would never walk again. However, her God-fearing mother refused to give up and kept on hoping for a miracle.

Finally, the miracle Stacy-Ann Noble was praying for to help her daughter walk again appears to be looming on the horizon. Following a recent medical procedure, which was financed by a good Samaritan, who wants no publicity, Tamara has now regained movement in both legs and is now able to wiggle her toes.

According to Tamara’s mother, the nightmare, the weight of which has started to lift, started when her daughter, who resides at Cooper’s Pen, Trelawny, was one of 13 persons who suffered injuries in a two-vehicle crash along the Martha Brae to Falmouth main road on February 17, 2007.

“The first news I got was that she had died. Thankfully, it was not so,” said Tamara’s mother. “She was diagnosed both at Falmouth Hospital and [Bustamante] Children’s Hospital with a spinal injury, which would see her crippled from the waist down. I was told she would not walk again.”

However, being a woman of faith, the determined mother decided she would do whatever it took to prove the diagnosis that Tamara would not walk again wrong. She held fast to the belief that God would answer her prayers.

Stacy-Ann made numerous visits to the Bustamante Hospital for Children requesting that additional tests be done on her daughter. But while she was told that an operation could be done, the discussions never progressed past that acknowledgement.

“I was told an operation could be done, but for three years I just kept on getting promises,” said Stacy-Ann, who remains resolute in her belief that Tamara will walk again.

In addition to hoping and praying, Stacy-Ann kept on seeking help and advice. She was never shy about telling her daughter’s story to anyone who would listen.

Finally, she met the good Samaritan, who after listening to her story, decided to help, albeit insisting that she wanted no publicity.

“She arranged for everything with Dr Mark Minott, who took on the medical challenge, including the operation that was done to straighten her knees,” said the now gleeful mother of three children. “She now has movement in both legs. She can wiggle her toes and can complain about pain in her left leg. Another set of operation is to be scheduled for her pelvic area.”

Delighted with the progress she has seen since the intervention of the good Samaritan and Minott, Stacy-Ann is now full of confidence that Tamara, who she described as “my little diamond”, will walk again.

Tamara, who has been doing extremely well in school, recently passed her Primary Exit Profile examinations for her dream school, Westwood High School. However, because she is wheelchair-bound, and there are no ramps at the school, she had to be transferred to William Knibb High School.

Despite her current challenges, Tamara has set her sights on becoming a medical doctor, and wants to put herself in a position to help persons with medical issues.

Last night, Dr Delroy Fray, the clinical coordinator for the Western Regional Health Authority, told The Gleaner that movement in the leg after a spinal injury is an indicator that healing is taking place and that the developments described would be an indication it is possible Tamara could walk again.

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