I can still remember the unspeakable joy that filled my heart the morning our daughter was born. The exhaust I had felt only moments before was gone. The pain I had experienced during labor–nothing more than a distant memory. But for Lisa Newkirk, author of Super Sticks, at the very moment when most mothers are rejoicing, her terror was just beginning. Watching as the nurse whisked away her precious daughter, covered in bandages, to an awaiting medevac, Lisa was gripped with pain and fear. Would her daughter make it through the night? What if she never got to hold her in her arms? And if she did make it, how would Lisa care for her? A month ago, she had never even heard of Spina Bifida. And in this moment of pain and fear, words failed her.

Women from Lisa’s church surrounded her and provided around the clock help. They brought food to Lisa’s family while she was in the hospital and transported Lisa’s breast milk to her baby—a baby that she had only had a glimpse of. Most of these women were moms with young children, and although their constant care and faithful prayers were appreciated, seeing them with their babies while Lisa hadn’t even held her own cut deep.

But comfort was on the way.

“A lady I had never met came to my hospital room with a suitcase full of pictures,” Lisa says. “Her child had spina bifida, just like mine. She told me not to believe all the horror stories the doctors had told me.”

“This woman gave me hope. And we are still friends today.”

And now Lisa wants to offer that same support and comfort to other parents and children who are learning to deal with Spina Bifida.

2 Corinthians 1:3-4 “Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves have received from God.”