Dec. 22, 2008

Christmas comes early for Madison Smith, family

By Kevyn Bowling

The holidays make people want to watch feel good movies like “It's a Wonderful Life”. This year, however, residents of Cherokee County don't need to fool with DVD players or cable programming. They have their own inspirational miracle involving a 6-year-old girl with angel-like characteristics of her own.

On the morning of Oct. 27, Felicia Smith was driving down Highway 9 like she did every morning. Her 2-year-old son Ross suddenly caused a commotion in the backseat. Smith turned around to discover he had somehow managed to wiggle out of his shoes. When she turned her attention back to the road, her car was already halfway off it. She overcompensated, and the car eventually landed upside down in a ditch facing in the opposite direction.

Smith freed herself and her son from the car, but her daughter Madison still sat buckled into her car seat. She doesn't remember much after that and her mother, Sharon Givens, only knows what she heard from witnesses.

“Jason Cambron was the first to arrive, and he got her out the car,” Givens said. “She had already stopped breathing and her lips were starting to turn blue. By then, others had stopped and gathered around.”

Givens said an elderly black man put his hands on Cambron's shoulder and said, “She's going to be OK.” She said he and others started to pray while Cambron performed CPR.

Soon, the sound of her crying let them know she had been revived. Medics flew Madison by helicopter from Goshen Church to Children's Hospital in Birmingham.

“When we arrived at Children's the first person we talked to was the chaplain because he wanted to start praying,” Givens said. “We knew then it was pretty serious.”

Madison suffered from internal decapitation, which is when the skull separates from the spinal column. Ninety percent of people die instantly; the rest are usually left paralyzed.

On Oct. 29, Madison went into surgery and came out with a contraption of rods and bolts known as a halo attached to her head and torso. She had three screws drilled into each side of her head, and plates and bones from a bone bank were inserted into her neck.

Madison left the hospital a week later. Therapists told the family she suffered from no loss of fine or motor skills. The only limitation might be that she won't have full range of motion in her neck. The family wholeheartedly believes that prayers are what pulled Madison through.

“It was unreal how many people knew about this nationwide and told they us were praying for her,” Givens said. A church in Woodstock, Ga., sent a nice card, and the congregation signed it. They sent her a pretty necklace, too, so whenever she wore it she could remember how God spared her life.”

Givens said people still stop her every day to ask how Madison is doing.

“Sometimes they are people I don't even know,” she said.

Madison's mother gets emotional when she thinks about what might have been.

“There is no way I could thank everybody enough for all they've done, for all their prayers,” Felicia said as the tears came.

After six weeks -- half the usual time required -- the halo is set to be removed Dec 22. Madison Smith and her mother and grandparents consider it an early Christmas present.