From Lemons to Lemonade!

Grace is a 7-year-old who loves laughing with friends, new adventures, and making the people around her smile. But her early years looked very different.

Just before her first birthday, Grace was diagnosed with autoimmune neutropenia, a rare condition that left her with dangerously low levels of infection-fighting white blood cells. Between the ages of one and four, the Stollery Children’s Hospital became a second home to our family. We spent countless days and nights in hospital rooms, emergency departments, clinics, and waiting areas, never knowing what the next infection or fever might bring.

The experience wasn’t perfect. We faced long wait times. We were turned away more than once, only to return when Grace’s condition worsened. Sleeping at the hospital as a parent was exhausting and uncomfortable, and there were moments of fear, frustration, and uncertainty that tested us in every way imaginable.

But through it all, the staff at the Stollery persevered.

The doctors, nurses, specialists, and countless healthcare workers who cared for Grace never gave up on her. They listened, investigated, advocated, reassured, and showed up for our family time and time again. Their expertise, compassion, and determination ultimately saved our daughter’s life.

By Grace’s fourth birthday, she had gone into remission. Today, she is thriving—a healthy, joyful 7-year-old with a future full of possibility.

Without the Stollery, she wouldn’t be here.

That is why supporting the Stollery is so important to our family. Donations help ensure that children facing their hardest days receive the exceptional care they deserve, and that families like ours have hope when they need it most. We know firsthand that the work happening within those walls changes lives—because it changed Grace’s.