History from 2018/ previous fundraiser: My daughter Virginia has sadly been in the hospital since April. It all started from going out for breakfast with my daughter and son. My daughter ordered over easy eggs as she usually does. That night her stomach ballooned to an astronomical size. I took her to our local hospital emergency room three times, they sent her home all three times stating that she had a pulmonary effusion under her right lung, possible pneumonia and unexplained abdominal distension. I was shocked that they merely prescribed a azithromycin and called it a day. My daughters pain and discomfort worsened threw the night and I contacted her primary physician the following morning and took her in that day. We sat in the room for 45 minutes with the doctor trying to figure out what could be going on. The doctor asked if we had been out to eat lately and if my daughter had any eggs. I then recalled that everything began that day we ate breakfast out. The doctor tested my daughters stool which came back positive for gastroenteritis, an intestinal infection caused by food poisoning. My daughter was immediately hospitalized at our local hospital, she was only there one night before she went into sepsis, a life-threatening complication of an infection. She was moved immediately to the ICU where her organs began to shut down. She was then transferred to Hamot hospital in Erie, PA. Hamot had no idea what to do and stated she had significant organ damage to her kidneys and liver and that her heart was struggling to function. Nearly 14 days at Hamot, while I was begging them to transfer her to Rochester for more specialized heart care. Between insurance hang ups and a lack of urgency it took nearly 3 days to get my daughter transferred. When we arrived at Strong Memorial Hospital in Rochester the doctors asked why did Hamot wait so long? For this I had no answer. Within less than twelve hours my daughter flat lined in the cath lab of Strong Memorial Hospital. I have never witness such an extraordinary team of nurses and doctors rush to save my daughters life. All the while I stood in awe knowing this was not it for her, it couldn't be, she had already been through so much in her life, this is not the end. They had to put my daughter on an Ecomo machine, which is an external machine that pumps the heart because it could no longer pump for itself. In addition, she had to have a tracheotomy and a feeding tube put in along with multiple drains to assist with draining the fluid build up due to poor organ function. The team of doctors informed me that she couldn't be on the Ecomo machine long and that it just wasn't safe and could cause infection and further complications. They explained that the only option was to implant a heart pump called an HVAD, Heart Ventricular Assist Device, in an attempt to keep her alive. Whether or not they performed this surgery is decided by a committee of doctors and specialists. An HVAD coordinator spoke to me about the risks and also asked me if this is what my daughter would want, I stated, "If you are asking me whether my daughter would want to live or die, I can't answer that for her but I can answer for me," and I said, "please do whatever you can to save my daughter, she's my life, my strength, my everything." I was later informed that the committee was not in agreement with performing the surgery and I was told she would probably pass in about three days. One surgeon came up to me and said, "I'm going to do the surgery, she either dies us having done nothing, or she dies having tried to save her life." Surgery took eight hours, and they explained life still hangs in the balance, they had little faith that she would recover from the surgery as her body was so weak, threw all things she then only weighted fifty-five pounds. Sadly, the HVAD is a band-aid effort to survival, she needs a heart transplant to survive and we are hoping the HVAD buys her time to recover and become strong enough to sustain transplant, in addition to a heart being available when she is ready, which will need to be a child size heart because she is so small and O + blood type. There is nothing more cumbersome than knowing someone's child has to die, so that mine can live. My daughter spent nearly two months in the Cardiac ICU and about three weeks ago moved to the step down unit to begin recovery. Last week she moved to the Rehab floor of Strong, where she will receive intensive therapy to try and regain strength to walk and perform daily activities again. My daughter worked her way off the trach and is currently working towards eating sufficiently on her own. As we hopefully are getting closer and closer to discharge each day I have been informed that most of the medical supplies my daughter needs are not covered by insurance, in addition she will be required to go up to Rochester for multiple appointments, tests and monitoring, in addition to therapies three times per week. Sadly, in the midst of an already tragic situation my son was in an automobile accident on May 1st, which resulted in our family now being without reliable transportation. Hospital social workers could only recommend trying to raise funds to help with the already devastating experience and hope for the best. They also stated medical transportation is not an option because times where she needs to be to Rochester in a timely fashion is the difference between life and death.