While watching the CHEO telethon last month, Ms. Padvaiskas donated money paid for curtains for Renee's room. Then she had an idea. "Let's do her room." She e-mailed Austin Toms and Jennifer Carr, the husband-wife team who operate Carr Toms and Associates Decorative Painters in Ottawa. "We were very excited," said Mr. Toms, who agreed to donate paint and labour.
"I just lost my father and grandmother," added Ms. Carr. "It felt like a nice thing to do."
By coincidence, the couple discovered they were married by the same minister as the Stocks.
Next, Ms. Padvaiskas visited retailers she deals with -- Linens & Things, EQ3 and C&M Textiles, all on Merivale Road, and Winners in Barrhaven. She showed them pictures of Renee with her strawberry blond hair and long eyelashes. "People immediately did whatever they could." They donated items for Renee's room, including a charming set of Sophie Harding prints, a green cushion, pink fabric and beading for pillows, a purple sparkly princess sign, hat boxes decorated with pixie characters and a purple lamp. Surefit Canada couriered slipcovers from Ajax, Ont. Maria Bakin, a seamstress whose son had been in CHEO years ago, sewed pillows on short notice.
"It's serendipity," said Ms. Padvaiskas. "All these people coming together. All these connections."
On Wednesday, Mrs. Stocks came home from the hospital at 1.am. At 9 a.m., Ms. Padvaiskas, Mr. Toms and Ms. Carr turned up with a surprise. "We're here to do Renee's room."
"Everything looks so beautiful," said Mrs. Stocks. "It's very warm and vibrant. It just brings the room to life."
Two weeks ago, Renee took a significant step toward recovery by breathing without a ventilator. The family is awaiting the results of genetic tests at Duke University Medical Center in North Carolina. "Renee was a conundrum to all of us," said Dr. David Creery, medical director of CHEO's intensive care unit. "I'm delighted she's done well. I can't say it's because of anything we did apart from supporting her through this."
She will likely require further treatment, and she still has a feeding tube in her stomach, and a line into a vein near her heart. "She's coming along really well," said Mrs. Stocks. "She does physiotherapy and occupational therapy every day. She's got her strength back. She's a very happy little girl."
The family has donated a number of items to the hospital's intensive care unit, including a TV, two DVD players, a fridge, a microwave oven, a radio and three rockers.
"You don't realize how much CHEO is worth to the community until you need them," said Mr. Stocks.
"We were wondering what we could do for them."
Photo: Kier Gilmour, The Ottawa Citizen
July 10, 2004
The Power of a Mother's Prayers
Maria Cook
Ottawa Citizen
Nine month old Renee Stocks kept smiling all the way through her ordeal, says her mother, Brenda Stocks.The baby was felled with a mysterious ailment that nearly killed her. In recognition of what the family went through, an interior decorator and retailers came together to make over the child's room.
The power of a mother's prayers:
Renee Stocks was minutes away from death when she was rushed to CHEO in April. Since then, many people have come together to help the little girl and her family, a situation for which her parents, Brenda and Andrew Stocks, are truly grateful. Maria Cook reports.
Article by: The Ottawa Citizen, Saturday, July 10, 2004
Page: E3, Section: City, Byline: Maria Cook, Column: Life in the City
Source: The Ottawa Citizen
A kind word is never lost
It keeps going on
From one person to another
Until it comes back to you again.
(Stencilled on a wall in Renee's room.)
Nine-month-old Renee Stocks looked curiously at her bedroom yesterday. It had been painted and decorated just three days ago in a spontaneous act of kindness by new friends and strangers.
"How do you say thank you to people like that?" said her mother, Brenda Stocks. "It leaves you speechless. It makes you believe in humanity."
Renee's room for the past 10 weeks has been in the Children's Hospital of Eastern Ontario, mostly in the intensive care unit. That's how sick she was. Yesterday, she came home to Manotick for a four-hour visit. With luck, she will be discharged from hospital in 10 to 14 days. "All mommy can think of is that prayers work," Mrs. Stock said as she watched the little girl kicking in her crib. "To see her come back almost from the dead is phenomenal."
Ottawa interior decorator Joanne Padvaiskas is one of the people behind the transformation of Renee's room from beige into a cheerful place to recuperate with colours such as pink, green, yellow and purple.
"It really is Pay It Forward," said Ms. Padvaiskas, referring to the Hollywood movie, in which a boy thinks up a simple idea to change the world: Do three big favours for three people, and ask them to pass it on.
"It's about doing something from the heart."
It all started in April when Mrs. Stocks hired Ms. Padvaiskas, owner of Wow! Great Place. They discovered they share a birthday -- both turn 39 on Monday. "I felt a huge connection with Brenda when we first met," said Ms. Padvaiskas. "It's not something that happens every day." But decorating was soon put on hold. At 4 a.m. on April 30, Renee was taken to the CHEO emergency department with what seemed to be a chest cold. She deteriorated quickly. Her liver was enlarged. She had secretions in her lungs. Her muscles were profoundly weak. Then she had a seizure. "She was minutes away from death," recalled Mrs. Stocks. "Her body completely failed."
Until then, she had been a healthy child. Tests showed that her liver was not working properly. Fat was being stored in her muscles. "She looked absolutely terrible," said Mrs. Stocks. "She was swollen from head to foot. We still to this day do not know what is causing this."
There were tubes in her nose, her tummy and her neck to help her breathe, eat, and supply blood for tests. She would undergo more than 100 tests. Through it all, Renee smiled. "She couldn't lift a finger but you'd say her name and she would smile," said Mrs. Stocks. "She's just a joy." The worried mother spent up to 16 hours a day at the hospital, while her husband, Andrew Stocks, an Ottawa paramedic, looked after their six-year-old son, Zachary.
Before biopsy surgery, Renee was baptized in hospital and Mrs. Stocks gave her a bath in water strewn with pink rose petals. She sent e-mail updates and photos to friends and family, including Ms. Padvaiskas.
