By CARA LORELLO
Staff Reporter
In most ways, Randi Mauritson, 18, of Cheney is your typical high school girl.
She loves all kinds of shopping—especially clothes—school, the movies (her favorite is “Sense and Sensibility”) and has a Johnny Depp poster on her bedroom wall.
Her favorite places to shop are Wal-Mart and Northtown Mall, according to her mother, Becky Jones. The two of them shop together almost every week, even when there's no money to spend, Jones said.
The only thing that sets Randi apart from most other girls her age is her cerebral palsy, a type of neurological disorder caused by abnormalities in parts of the brain that control muscle movements that often appears during infancy or early childhood.
Randi was a newborn when doctors detected her condition after a virus caused bleeding inside her brain. “It took a few weeks [to diagnose] but the damage was done by then,” Jones said.
Though cerebral palsy can't be cured, Randi has been able to adapt to and lead a near-normal life through her family's help, which at home includes Jones, who works for Cheney School District, and younger sister Chelsea, a sophomore at Cheney High School where Randi will be a junior this fall.
Jones said in the past year, Randi's added five inches to her height, making them the same height at 5-foot-5. “It's been a challenge keeping weight on her,” she said of Randi's very small frame. “She's really progressed physically. Mentally, she's normal.”
Though Randi's condition prevents her from being able to talk normally, she's found ways to communicate with her family through a system of blinks and different eye movements, and can respond with a “yes” or a “no,” Jones said.
“She didn't talk for the first four years, and those are very formative years for children [but] she's always been the happiest kid I know—very well-adjusted,” she added.
Jones's neighbor, Shanell Radtke, said she noticed this was true about Randi in spite of her illness.
“It seems like she's missed out on a lot of things in life…but she brings joy to the life of everyone around her,” Radtke said of why she chose to nominate Randi to receive a wish last spring from the Wishing Star Foundation, a 24-year-old organization that grants wishes to local children, ages 3 to 21, suffering from life-threatening illness in eastern and central Washington and Idaho.
The non-profit foundation selects applicants to receive wishes they submit based on what can be arranged through their funding.
Applicants must meet certain criteria to qualify for a wish, including a doctor's approval, all of which Randi met.
Randi submitted three wishes: a cruise vacation, a shopping spree, and a bedroom “makeover.” The foundation was able to grant both the shopping spree wish and threw in the bedroom makeover through some generous donations from local outlets stores at the Spokane Valley Mall.
These stores included Macy's, Sears, Deb, Best Buy and JC Penny, which was where Randi, along with her mother, sister and foundation wish coordinator Mary Meek got a new canopy bed set and a Tiffany lamp for the makeover portion of Randi's wish. Most of the stores gave gift cards ranging from $115 to $500 in value.
At Macy's, Sears and Deb, it was all clothes and a bit of jewelry, Jones said.
“We hit the sale racks at Deb,” she said. “They have size-0. We ended up with a lot of clothes. She had so much fun picking stuff out.”
At Best Buy, they picked out a flat screen Toshiba TV and DVD player. This was followed by lunch and a special treat courtesy of the Frullati Café and Bakery and Chocolate Myracles.
“All the stores donated to her. We started the day at 10 a.m. and finished around 3:30 p.m. [Randi] was a real trooper,” Meek said of their July 10 day of shopping. The total dollar value of Randi's wish came to about $1,750, she added.
“Every cent was spent,” Meek said.
Jones said they managed to fit all their merchandise into their mini van that afternoon.
“Randi was exhausted, sitting on the couch surrounded by loot with this big grin on her face,” she said, adding that though it's been three weeks, Randi has yet to go through all the clothes they purchased.
“She hasn't worn the same thing twice,” Jones said, who's currently saving money from the three jobs she's working to pay for the family to go on the cruise vacation the week before school that was her daughter's first wish.
Cara Lorello can be reached at [email protected]
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