Meet Madelyn \u201cMaddie,\u201d a bright, determined 3-year-old with a huge personality and an incredible fighting spirit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Before her medical journey began, Maddie loved dancing, playing, going on family adventures, and keeping everyone around her smiling. In July 2025, everything changed when she suddenly developed problems with her balance, abnormal eye movements, weakness, and other neurological symptoms. After months of testing, treatments, hospital stays, and searching for answers, she was diagnosed with Opsoclonus-Myoclonus-Ataxia Syndrome (OMAS), a rare neurological condition often associated with neuroblastoma.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One year after her symptoms began, Maddie’s family received the devastating answer they had been searching for: Stage 4 neuroblastoma. Her cancer had spread to distant areas of her body, including her skull, and she is now undergoing an intensive treatment journey that includes chemotherapy, procedures, extended hospital stays, stem cell transplant, and continued treatment for OMAS.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Through everything, Maddie is still Maddie\u2014smart, silly, loving, strong-willed, and incredibly aware of the world around her. She has endured more in her three years than most people will in a lifetime, yet she continues to smile, play, love, and fight.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Her family has one phrase they have carried with them throughout this journey:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Keep Swimming. \u2764\ufe0f<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Funds raised for COTA in honor of Maddie will help with transplant-related expenses her family faces throughout her treatment and recovery. Every donation to COTA for Maddie\u2019s Journey, every share, prayer, and word of encouragement helps support Maddie and her family as they navigate the long road ahead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Thank you for being part of Maddie’s journey and helping her Keep Swimming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The Children\u2019s Organ Transplant Association (COTA) helps children and young adults who need a life-saving transplant by providing fundraising assistance and family support. COTA is the nation\u2019s only fundraising organization solely dedicated to raising life-saving dollars in honor of transplant-needy children and young adults. 100% of each contribution made to COTA in honor of our patients helps meet transplant-related expenses. COTA\u2019s services are free to our families, and gifts to COTA are tax deductible to the fullest extent of the law.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Meet Madelyn \u201cMaddie,\u201d a bright, determined 3-year-old with a huge personality and an incredible fighting spirit. Before her medical journey began, Maddie loved dancing, playing, going on family adventures, and keeping everyone around her smiling. In July 2025, everything changed when she suddenly developed problems with her balance, abnormal eye movements, weakness, and other neurological […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":106,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-14","page","type-page","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n