Two-year-old Lelah had what her mom thought was the flu. She took her to the pediatrician when she wasn’t getting better and, in an instant, the flu turned into a month stay in the hospital where the little girl fought for her life. Lelah’s mom, Shai, was nine-months pregnant with her second child and sat in the Cooper ICU for days while Lelah was treated for a severe respiratory infection and sepsis, a blood infection.

Today, more than five years later, Lelah is a healthy first grader with tennis on her mind. This is her story.

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By Jerry Bonner

Jerry Bonner with Barbara McCarty, MS, CCLS, Child Life Coordinator

“If I could wave my magic wand, I’d make everything all right…” ~ From the song, “Presto” by Rush.

I think all of us have echoed the sentiment of the lyrics quoted above at one time or another during our lives. We all would like a chance to hit the reset button, or to get some sort of “do over” for something that went wrong or some past mistake that we made.

Alas, we live in the real world. This is a not a video game or a fairy tale where multiple chances, miracle cures and happy endings are commonplace. Bad things happen to good people every day and the best that you can hope for, realistically, is the opportunity to give something back – to do a little good if and when the situation arises.

When I won the new version of the Xbox 360 from GamePro just such an opportunity arose. At that point, I had a perfectly good Xbox 360 Pro still sitting in my home entertainment center. What to do with it?

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