Help Abriella Get a Reliable Handicap Van

Hi! We are the Cochran family!

We are a small family of 5: My husband Julian Sr; myself, Rheanna, Julian Jr; our daughter, Abriella; and our youngest son, Kyson. We live in a small rural town in Nebraska where I grew up.

The beautiful girl in the pictures is Abriella and she is the reason I have started this gofundme page.

Abriella has rett syndrome, which is a rare neurological disorder that causes a lot of different symptoms and medical problems and it mainly affects girls. It can also be seen in boys but is much more rare.

Rett syndrome steals the abilities, the voices and the freedom from girls early on in life or gradually. A lot of girls with rett syndrome are wheelchair or bed bound and rely on someone else to care for them their whole life. Some girls never lose the ability to walk but they do lose other abilities. It's a regressing disorder.

Abriella cannot walk anymore, she cannot talk, or use her hands in a purposeful manner. She was diagnosed at the age of 2 after a lot of symptoms, seizures, medications, labs, testing, procedures and doctor and hospital visits and therapies.

Despite this diagnosis, she is such a light to be around and her smile could melt the sun!

A little about the rest of us:

I'm Rheanna,39. I'm currentlt a stay at home mom after leaving my nursing career in 2018 to stay home to help my husband and take care of Abriella and our 2 boys. Then, about 2 years ago I found out I have relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis. I am currently on a medication that keeps it stable and from progressing further.

My husband, Julian Sr, is 40 and he is disabled. He deals with a lot of back pain with spinal stenosis and degenerative disk disease and he has had 3 back surgeries since 2011. One of those surgeries was to implant a spinal cord stimulator into his spine which no longer works.

Both our boys, Julian Jr (19) and Kyson (9) are healthy. Our oldest no longer lives at home, but they both care about their sister very, very much and they help us help her as much as they can because she is completely dependent on us for everything.

Abriella loves to crusie around town in her special carriage just for her and she hates not being able to go places. Her special carriage is our handicap van and it's the only vehicle we have that we can get her to and from school, which she absolutely loves, and to and from her specialists appts.

Her specialists are 2 hours away from where we live and our van is not trustworthy enough to drive her there and back home again.

We have had our current van since 2016 and unfortunately it has been having issue after issue recently. Its been one thing after another.

With that said we are currently looking for a handicap van that is reasonably priced and reliable.

However, we are not in a financial situation where we can afford another van ourselves. At least not alone.

About 10 years ago we had a benefit for Abriella which helped us pay for most of the cost of the current van we have. We had to jump through some hoops to make that possible but it was worth it. And we found out just how big and supportive our support system really is.

Since we don't have time to put together anther benefit, I have decided to start a gofundme page for Abriella's princess carriage. I know times are hard for everyone right now but even just a little from a lot of people helps. If you can't help by donating then please share our story!

Thanks so much for reading and please, please share!!