Famliy portrait taken in Maggie Valley, NC,
July, 2002.
Dear Family & Friends,
Until next time remember...God LOVES you and so do we!
Greetings from South Carolina’s coast! We hope that the past year has been a happy, productive, and prosperous one for you and your family. At this time of year when we celebrate the miracle of Christ’s birth we are excited to share with you the most wonderful news about the miracle we are experiencing in our lives this Advent season.
As many of you know, we were blessed in April with the birth of our second son, Cooper Anderson. During Becky’s pregnancy it was discovered that Cooper also carried the defective gene for Spinal Muscular Atrophy, just as his older brother Carson does, and we were told to expect Cooper to suffer similar physical effects of the disease.
We are happy and excited to report that, to date, Cooper has shown absolutely no signs of the disease and is advancing in his physical and cognitive development at warp speed. Unlike Carson, Cooper has already reached the point of crawling, pulling up, creeping, and most recently walking with assistance. It is only a matter of days or weeks we think before he is walking on his own totally!
Cooper is, indeed, our miracle baby! God has heard our prayers and the prayers of the hundreds of others who have kept our family in their hearts and prayers over these past 17 months. How wonderful it is to have favor with God and, despite all that we may still face, we are forever grateful for the thrill that our “little miracle” is giving us today.
Like Cooper, Carson continues to excel in his own special ways. He will turn 6 on December 19th and we are thankful that for the past six years Carson’s health and spirit have remained strong. He is a bright and sociable kindergartner at Myrtle Beach Primary and is blessed with kind, caring, and loving teachers and his personal aide, Ms. Heidi. Everyone, from the custodians all the way up to the school principal, knows Carson and loves him.
When he’s not in school, Carson enjoys playing with other children in our neighborhood who have taken to making sure they spend time with him and include him in their activities despite his physical limitations. When he’s not “tooling around” the neighborhood, he likes to play with his cars and trucks, color pictures, and play computer games. He is especially excited about the fact he will be getting a new wheelchair sometime in early January. He has outgrown his old chair, which he’s had since he was 2, so it has come time for a new model with all the latest bells and whistles.
Mom and Dad Berry have discovered that having two rambunctious boys in the house – and one that is actually mobile – is quite a challenge and also quite time consuming. As a result, there isn’t much time for Mom and Dad to enjoy their pastimes anymore.
Becky continues to work full-time, after an extended maternity leave this past spring and summer, at Busy Bodies Child Care Center where she supervises the infant room. It was nice to have Becky home for the summer and for the whole family to be able to spend time together without one of us having to be at work. We all enjoyed an extended summer vacation in July to both Grandma’s houses in Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Becky thrives on spending time with the boys and is the world’s best mom – in our eyes anyway. When she does get some time to herself she still enjoys shopping, reading, and just having time to rest and relax a bit.
Jim continues to work as the Director of Sports Medicine at Myrtle Beach High School. Now in his 12th year, he has been challenged this year due to a smaller staff of assistants than he has had in recent years. Fortunately, he has a good group of students and one dedicated volunteer assistant who have all stepped up in the crunch to make sure no one has had to pull too much extra duty. Everyone that works with Jim is sensitive to his need to be home as much as possible to help Becky with Carson and Cooper and they do their best to make that happen as often as they can. Unfortunately, the job still carries with it long hours and late evenings, often leaving Becky with all the home duties.
Despite the long hours and limited home time, Jim loves MBHS and his job, although he still deals with the usual frustrations. He is now able to enjoy the benefits of a decade of hard work building the sports medicine program. If you’d like to see what he’s done, go online and visit the program web site at www.seahawksportsmedicine.com.
Again, we hope that 2002 has been a blessed year for you and yours and we hope that in 2003 those blessings will continue. We are so thankful and appreciative for all of the family and friends who have always extended their love and friendship to each of us. We are especially thankful for all of you who have kept our children in your daily thoughts and prayers over the years and we ask you to continue to do so – they need them and so do we. God favors those who trust in him and have faith in him. We know He will favor each of you.
So, at this time when we celebrate Christ’s birth, let us leave you with this blessing… May the Lord bless you and keep you. May the Lord make His face to shine upon you and be gracious unto you. And may God give you His peace in your going out and in your coming in, in your lying down and in your rising up, in your labor and in your leisure, in your laughter and in your tears... Until you come to stand before Jesus in that day in which there is no sunset and no dawning. Amen.
Links to our family, friends, & special places...
Carson's Page
Cooper's Page
Jim's Page
Seahawk Sports Medicine Homepage
First Presbyterian Church - Myrtle Beach
National Athletic Trainers Association
Scottish Rite Children's Hospital
Shriner's Hospital for Children - Greenville,SC
Berry's Basket - Beginnings
troll for trout - West Michigan's Premier Pop/Alternative Band
Ronald McDonald House Charities
INFOnet - Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions
Families of SMA Homepage
Muscular Dystrophy Association (MDA)
Living SMArt (More info on SMA)
Internet Resources for Special Children
Myrtle Beach Primary School (Carson's School)
