Ms. Lungershausen assists Yuna with everything, including feeding her and, with another aide’s help, changing her diapers. She recently made colorful shapes for Yuna to grab while the second-graders studied fractions. “We have our bad days,” Ms. Lungershausen said. But she said Yuna increasingly recognizes phrases like “Let’s find the library door,” recently “brought a Kleenex to her nose after being prompted” and “brought my hand to her mouth and ‘kissed’ it, deliberately, first time since I’ve known her.”
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At 41 pounds, Yuna weighs 10 pounds less than her little brother, Joon, 5, who has begun helping care for his older sister. One day, after Yuna’s state-funded caregiver, Anne Marie Nguyen, bathed her and propped her in a baby play center to dry her, Joon, announcing he had finished “going potty,” brushed Yuna’s hair. Seeing her rip the bathroom thermostat’s cover off, Joon pulled Yuna’s hands from the wall, saying, “Don’t touch that.”
When Soo-Kyung returned home after lab work involving gene manipulation in mouse and chicken brains, she crouched on the playroom carpet, watching Yuna commando crawl and elbow herself to a sitting position. She lifted Yuna into the special walker, called a gait trainer and, waving toys, coaxed her to propel the contraption with her feet.
Then came Yuna’s nightly FaceTime visit with her grandparents in South Korea, who sing and show pictures as Yuna intermittently eyes the screen. Later, Jae played guitar, while Soo-Kyung held Yuna, keeping her rangy arms from tearing into the instrument. Yuna smiled and bobbed.
Soo-Kyung rarely used to mention her daughter to fellow scientists, but recently began thanking Yuna during presentations. “I was afraid every day that she might not be with me the next day,” Soo-Kyung said, voice breaking. “But she’s done amazing things that we wouldn’t dare to dream. So, how can anyone say she will never be able to do this, she will never be able to do that?”
They carried Yuna upstairs to her giant crib, her body arching elastically. Carting her up and down is getting harder, so the Lees expect to move from the three-level, cliff-side house they bought to be closer, for Yuna’s sake, to the hospital and their labs. With breathtaking views of Mount St. Helen’s, it is an optimist’s house, where it is possible to see beyond the horizon.
Source : Nytimes
