My name is Eyal Sherman, and I was born in Syracuse, New York, May 3rd, 1981. Until I was just about four and a half years old, life was pretty good. I was more or less your typical toddler. I loved baseball, Scubee Doo and Heathcliffe, doing large jig-saw puzzles, and painting.
I guess you could say I was always big for my age. My father and mother would joke that I could play middle linebacker for the New York Giants. My hair was strawberry blond, and my eyes dark brown.
Every couple of months, I would come down with some kind of respiratory illness. It made me very irritable and anxious. These bouts of illness, which my pediatrician would dismiss as just common colds that most kids my age get, became increasingly acute and frequent. I was hospitalized for several cases of pneumonia. And now, with hindsight, it was apparent that something was desperately wrong.
In February of 1986, I was taken to the hospital. It was discovered that I had a tumor the size of a golf ball in my brain stem. My family was told I had only months, if not weeks, to live. A biopsy confirmed that position. I was taken home and became progressively weakened. I needed a trache and huge dosages of steroids which bloated my appearance, and I lost the ability to walk.
My parents, in searching the world, discovered a physician at New York University, Dr. Fred Epstein, Chief of Pediatric Neurosurgery, who at that time was doing surgery on the delicate area of the brain stem. In August of 1986, we flew to New York University Hospital on an airplane called the Mercy Airlift (provided by a group of commercial airlines and born-again Christians, who donate their time and services to transport desperately ill kids).
Surgery took place, and a significant portion of the tumor was resected, but several days after the surgery, I suffered a brain stem stroke. I was in a coma for three months, and emerged intellectually intact, but highly physically compromised. I am on a ventilator 24 hours a day. I am a total quadriplegic. My vocal cords are frozen, and I receive my nutrition and nourishment through a feeding tube.
And yet-with all these apparent disabilities, after spending just about two years in hospitals and institutions-through creative federal and state entitlement programs and private insurance, I returned home.
Since 1988, I have lived with my family at home. I attend the Syracuse public school system. I am in a Regents program. I paint with a mouth stick. I have been a member of the Challenger Baseball Team. And, if I may say so, I play a wicked third base. I play the drums with my mouth stick. And I interface with a computer.
In June of 1994, I celebrated my Bar Mitzvah on the pulpit of the synagogue, Temple Adath Yeshurun, where my father is the rabbi. I intend to graduate high school on time and to attend Syracuse University, perhaps as a sports journalism major. I am a big basketball fan and, not only do I attend Syracuse University basketball games, but also I've been invited to attend many of the practices. I was especially pleased to be one of their most enthusiastic fans as Syracuse went to the "Final Four."
My own life story is such that I do not see problems as problems, but rather as challenges and opportunities. Our family has a large van. I have been the guest of Make-A-Wish Foundation in Disney World. I have also traveled to Niagara Falls, Philadelphia, Cooperstown, the Thousand Islands, and Boston Massachusetts.
I am presently researching rehabilitation centers. The old thinking was that, after six months of the kinds of problems that I have had, what you see is what you get. I know better. Everyday there is an opportunity for greater growth. Everyday I see and I know there is further recovery.