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Cerebral Palsy Victim
Cerebral palsy is a serious birth injury that affects many families in the U.S. The birth injury causes lifelong challenges to both victims and their families, making it difficult to achieve life goals. That’s why this story is so heatwarming and inspiring.
Tyler Sexton was born in February 1986, 12 weeks earlier than expected. Soon after the birth, his lungs collapsed and posed such a danger that his parents were told that he would probably not live. Even after pulling through the ordeal, he was eventually diagnosed with spastic diplegia, a form of cerebral palsy. He was 18 months old when his parents noticed that he was not able to sit up or crawl very easily. Because the cerebral palsy affected his lower extremities, doctors predicted that he would spend the rest of his life in a wheelchair.
However, Tyler committed himself to proving doctors wrong and worked with a physical therapist beginning at age three when he received his first walker.
“It was just embedded in me,” Tyler said. ”My parents instilled in me such a perseverance. If Mom and Dad say I can walk, then I can walk.”
After spending years improving his balance and muscle control through therapy and undergoing 16 surgeries, Tyler learned to walk on his own. He also learned to get around independently with the help of a Segway and his golden retriever service dog named Danny. After graduating magna cum laude from the University of Southern Florida in 2007, Tyler enrolled in the University of Sint Eustatius School of Medicine to become a doctor.
Despite application denials from interviewers at other medical schools and warnings that patients did not want a doctor who was disabled, Tyler graduated from medical school this June with a medical doctorate in hyperbaric medicine.
Currently an adjunct professor at the university, he has already passed the medical boards and is currently interviewing for residencies. He and his mother have also written a book, God Bless These Little Legs, documenting his battle with cerebral palsy.
“I am an example that all things are possible, and I can tell a patient that I know how they feel and mean it,” he said.
If you or a loved one have given birth to a child with cerebral palsy, there are treatment options available that may be able to help the child overcome some of the disabilities they are facing and lead a normal life. Speak to a birth injury attorney at American Law Partners today to learn whether it is possible to bring a lawsuit against a doctor or medical center that may have caused the birth injury.
