What Happened To The Girl From Animal Adventure Park

The crowd clusters around a alpine enclosure on a broad wooden deck, necks craned to catch a glimpse of three giraffes and the man whose simple idea made them famous.

This September 24-hour interval is 1 of the public'due south terminal chances to interact with the diverse menagerie at Animal Take chances Park, including a sure mother named April.

Jordan Patch asks the crowd to take two steps dorsum. And merely one more after that.

"Show of hands: Who's here from out of boondocks?" he calls.

Dozens of hands shoot into the air.

A worldwide spotlight shines on this park now, thanks to the live-streamed pregnancy of Apr the giraffe and the birth of her calf, Tajiri, on April 15.

It's brought triple the amount of visitors, hailing from all over the world, to the 15-acre park in the tiny upstate New York town of Harpursville, and a lot more than attention on the park'due south owner, who at present gets stopped and asked to accept a photograph every few steps every bit he navigates the winding path of the beast haven he built in 2013.

Simply beyond the spotlight brought past their giraffe family, Patch'southward family unit has had a more personal, more than precious success.

Jordan and wife Colleen's young girl, Ava, whose first months of life were riddled with medical turmoil and dubiousness, is, for the kickoff time since she was 3 months old, gratis from the frequent and terrifying seizures that have plagued her.

Her tumultuous fight

Before Ava Joelle Patch was born on Jan. 15, 2016, doctors discovered an arachnoid cyst — the cyst sits between the surface of the brain and the cranial base or on the arachnoid membrane, one of the three membranes that cover the brain and the spinal cord.

A surgery to remove the cyst when she was iii months old was followed past infection and seizures, which have hindered her development since.

Some days Ava had 30 seizures.

It took months to assemble enough clues — agenesis of the corpus callosum, spots on the retina, infantile spasms — to diagnose Ava's condition: Aicardi syndrome.

While many reached out to the Patches offering their monetary back up, they've rerouted the effort to assist other families with children facing similar battles. This year, their Ava's Little Heroes fundraising event raised $40,000 for local families.

Now nearing 2 years one-time, Ava has been prescribed a line of different medications, put on a ketogenic diet (that'due south a loftier-fat diet used in medicine to treat forms of epilepsy in children) and monitored closely for changes.

She has therapy five times a week: physical therapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy.

Ava has hit her milestones, but more slowly than what is considered normal. She doesn't have much muscle tone or movement in her left side. She's had fewer seizures, but they all the same occurred.

Over time, the new parents were told, they'd get life threatening. They'd have to wait and see.

On Oct. 24, they took desperate activeness.

"We said, 'Alright, we're doing this and nosotros're doing it now,'" Jordan said.

And then, Ava's parents peered downwards at their daughter in a pocket-sized metal crib at Children'south Hospital of Philadelphia and told her they loved her. A squad of medical professionals then began a hemispherotomy, a five-hour operation disconnecting the right side of Ava'southward brain. (The left side had never produced a seizure.)

During those hours, Hashemite kingdom of jordan and Colleen talked about everything just what was happening within the operating room. They sat in the waiting room with their parents, 200 miles away from a tiny photographic camera, the size of a pack of mucilage, that continued to usher thousands of virtual viewers into Jordan's now-world-famous giraffe barn.

Year of the giraffe

Before Ava'due south surgery, even before Ava'southward nascency, when Jordan Patch first opened Beast Risk Park in 2013, he had a dream: By year five, he wanted giraffes on site. Ahead of schedule, the park has not one giraffe, but a family of them.

"Dreams become reality upwardly hither," he said during a recent interview at the park.

In December 2016, scientists added giraffes to the list of threatened and endangered animals, according to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, listing them as "vulnerable to extinction."

"The whole purpose of having giraffes is preservation, genetic diversity," Patch said.

He saw streaming Apr's pregnancy every bit an opportunity to educate.

"With one video endeavor, we literally changed the way the world saw giraffes and conservation," he said. "It provided sustainability for the park, but information technology likewise created an awareness about giraffes that conservationists and scientists and zoologists have tried to do for decades."

Role of the funding from a naming contest for Tajiri was earmarked for giraffe conservation, the park sent its own gift of $30,000 to the crusade, and with every trip to Creature Gamble Park — now a bucket listing destination for children and adults worldwide — visitors are treated to the park's "giraffe talk," a lesson on the anatomy, habits and global vulnerability of giraffes.

The spotlight, business relationships and attention have also allowed Patch to make big changes at the park.

'It is an hazard'

Since the start of the 2017 season, admission tripled, staff doubled and the world of possibility expanded with Patch'south buy of 115 acres of land sitting straight across from the park.

This year brought the improver of nine new species, which equates to "at least 20 to 30 new animals," Patch said. Some are rescues, some are swapped with other animal parks to diversify bloodlines. The park's East African Crowned Cranes, brought from the Greatcoat May County Zoo, are a result of its starting time Species Survival Plans programme partnership.

At that place's a new South American primate building, larger parking lot, repaved and widened park paths. Coinciding with the kickoff Jungle Bells, a recurring winter weekend upshot beginning Dec. 2, there will exist a new welcome heart and gift shop.

"The successes of this year will let united states of america to continue this for years to come up," Jordan said.

In Oct, the New York State Tourism Industry Clan recognized Patch's efforts, with a tourism excellence laurels.

Thousands of viewers still check in with their favorite giraffe family every day on the park's live stream. In that location's been wild speculation over the possibility of some other pregnancy for April — the truth is they don't know yet, and Patch says he couldn't safely confirm a pregnancy until the 6-8-calendar month mark.

It all ensures a potent public interest in the success of Animal Adventure Park, only Patch is cautious to practise too much expanding and edifice too soon, concerned the bubble might burst.

Then, Jordan and family volition do what they've learned to practise and then well. They'll wait and encounter.

Swell expectations

When Ava came out of surgery, she was noticeably groggy. That was not a surprise.

And so her left arm moved. That was a surprise.

Colleen and Jordan watched their daughter, waiting for her optics to deviate to the right, for the straightened arm or curled toes, all the signs of Ava'due south seizures.

Nothing.

She even gave her surgeon a high five that night.

The next few days were tough. There were moments Ava cried and Colleen wasn't immune to selection her up — it was imperative a drain be kept level with Ava's brain — and others when she wouldn't eat. Just each day brought a growing sense of victory: another solar day seizure-free.

The family, which had packed for a month-long stay, was miraculously cleared to return domicile that week. No inpatient therapy. No complications.

Ava'due south been seizure-complimentary since.

This twenty-four hours in mid-Nov, 3 weeks post-surgery, is by all accounts a mundane afternoon within Animal Run a risk'south new welcome eye.

Ava sits on the slightly dusty floor surrounded by empty brownish boxes and non far from a pile of costly pigs. She grabs concur of one.

2 cardboard pizza boxes sit on the counter meridian for members of Jordan'due south crew, who proceed making sporadic appearances, grabbing a quick seize with teeth earlier heading back out to nourish to all the little details to prepare the park for its winter debut — Jungle Bells, a daytime event complete with Santa's Workshop, reindeer and a candy pikestaff lane, begins December. ii.

"Here," Jordan says, getting a good grip underneath his daughter's arms and pulling her up to stand. "Walk to Mama."

Ava takes a determined step with her correct human foot, then kicks her left forward. Jordan steadies her.

"Adept girl," Colleen says, reaching out. "Come across before, she would never do that on her own. Nosotros'd have to push button [her leg]."

Ava squeals and bounces, smacking her lips until they make a popping sound, mimicking her dad.

She's loud and excitable, every bit the almost-2-year-sometime. Merely the long scar beneath her pilus that curves effectually her head, and the fainter one beneath information technology, are clues to the ordeal this little daughter has endured.

When Colleen spoons some of Ava'due south snack — a precisely measured mixture of canola oil, yogurt and heavy cream adhering to her ketogenic nutrition — into her oral cavity, she smiles upwards at Jordan and hums in approval.

In a few months, Ava will exist weaned from the diet and eating normally. Perchance by then she'll be walking, likewise. She'due south already started getting into trouble, her parents say, scooting around and grabbing everything in sight. They never had to baby-proof before.

"We're learning the new Ava," Hashemite kingdom of jordan said. "The fact that we tin can motility on as a family unit now and feel some normalcy to our life, that's a welcome change."

With the new Ava come slap-up expectations, of a growing family unit — they're expecting another daughter in 2018 — a growing park, and a dream Hashemite kingdom of jordan has had since Ava was born: to meet her running through the animal park, the park he created, handing carrots to giraffes and bottle-feeding baby pigs.

Everything else, they'll wait and encounter, and take as information technology comes.

All this is in time, because Colleen's due date for baby number two, Ella Noelle Patch, is — wait for it — April 15, the same date their park's giraffe duo became a trio and made news worldwide.

Jordan calls information technology serendipity.

If you go

What: Jungle Bells

When: 11 a.m. to iii p.m. Dec. two-3, December. nine-ten, Dec. xvi-17 and Dec. 23

Where: Animal Chance Park, 85 Martin Loma Route, Harpursville

Cost: $12.99 adults, $11.99 seniors, $x.99 children three-xi and free admission to children 2 and under.

More than information: theanimaladventurepark.com/

In Stories to Share, reporter Katie Sullivan spends time with the Southern Tier'due south most fascinating people. She'due south looking for stories that volition brand y'all express joy, cry or exist inspired. Know of someone who should exist featured? Email her at ksullivan@pressconnects.com, and follow her on Twitter @ByKatieSullivan.

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Source: https://www.pressconnects.com/story/news/connections/2017/11/24/animal-adventure-ava-park/871297001/

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