Emilie
Monday, October 31, 2011
By: Kit B.

Support Group Leader

In March 2009, my fifteen year old son suffered two strokes within a two week period. The stress and anxiety it created was overwhelming for both my son and I. When looking for a support group, I stumbled across the Pediatric Stroke Network ("PSN"). PSN has a Board comprised of parents who have children that had strokes. The current President, Emilie Heath, has been a member of PSN since 1999, which she joined within three weeks of her son being born, and took over as President in 2008.

Taylor suffered a stroke at birth from medical negligence, which damaged 97% of the left side of his brain. Emilie works hard at putting information out to us parents daily, even though she is not paid, regarding school laws, bills in congress or within the state legislation on disability, medicine most of us parents use, articles on children, etc. Both Emilie and her son have spoken to State Senators, Representatives, and Congressmen regarding Taylor's stroke, Pediatric Stroke legislation, as well as advocates for AHA.

It feels good to receive a notification on a topic and have parents give feedback of how it affected them and what they are doing currently. By having Emilie as one of your Faces of Stroke, more parents like myself or in general will know that there are children, babies even unborn, who suffer stroke and someone like Emilie is there to support them because she never wants a parent to feel alone on this journey.