As Magda Newman prepared to welcome her firstborn, she labored for almost 17 hours before giving birth. After such a long and tiring labor, she wanted nothing more than to then hold her son. To her surprise, doctors held off showing her the newborn instead of seeing her son. She saw looks of horror on the medical team’s faces. What’s going on here, Magda asked she couldn’t hear her son crying.
It was making her worry that something had happened to him. Instead of bringing her son to her for some skin-to-skin contact, they took him to a back room where more and more people began to rush in Magda was left alone in a room filled with deafening silence. The worst thoughts began to flood Magda’s mind and at one point she thought her baby was dead because nobody wanted to tell her what was happening. What’s going on, I want to see the baby Magda asked the doctors once more. However, they wouldn’t give her an answer.
As they continued to examine her son, while Magda was left anxious, the doctors decided to First inform her husband Russell Newman about what was going on. Instead of congratulating him on the baby, he brought out a textbook. They showed him a page about Treacher Collins syndrome with an image of a teenager with a condition. It was a rare congenital craniofacial disorder that affected only one in fifty thousand people in the United States. That’s gon na be my kid Russell.
Couldn’t help but ask about the condition: didn’t appear on any of Magda’s prenatal scans and it took them by absolute surprise. Aside from the baby’s craniofacial disorder, he also wasn’t braving. The doctors did everything they could to save the little man when Magda finally saw her son. She couldn’t believe her eyes. He had no cheekbones and no upper lower eyelids just completely disfigured the couple named their baby boy Nathaniel and it took a year before Magnet, could look at him without flinching.
A lot of adjustments needed to be done on their part. The worried parents contacted the Institute of reconstructive plastic surgery on irps, a hospital that worked directly with kids, who had Treacher Collins. After leaving a message, they received a call from a certain Shelly Cohen, who turned out to be a speech and language pathologist when Russell answered the call he was taken aback by the first thing. Shelley said, I said hello who’s this. She goes it’s Shelley Cohn!
Congratulations, that was the first person who said to us. Congratulations, no one congratulated us. Yet, while Shelley was the very first person to congratulate Magda and Russell on their baby boy, Russell wasn’t in a celebratory mood, and this woman Shelly. She goes hey. Mr. Newman, you had a baby boy.
I heard that’s wonderful, I remember going. Are you freaking nuts, but before he could say anything else? Shirley assured him. Their son would live a long, beautiful life he held on to that statement, and it gave him hope after ashore, while Nathaniel was transferred to NYU Langone, where he stayed for an entire month. Throughout his stay there, the nurses could tell how devastated his parents were Magda and Russell needed all the encouragement they could get.
They were devastated, hopeless, and full of fear. Until the day they found themselves watching the Grammys at the hospital on the television screen was Christina. Aguilera sang her song Beautiful at that moment, the couple believed the singer was singing directly to them, no matter what they say, no matter what words can’t bring them down, he became their Anthem and the song began to resonate with them. Parents began to recondition their thinking. Instead of focusing on their child’s appearance, they shifted their perspective.
Believing Nathaniel will be beautiful because of his personality. After the empowering message from Christina Russell and Magda headed down to the NICU to see their son, it was then that they held him for the first time. Magda recalled, I almost cried every day every single time I looked at him. I couldn’t believe it was my child. I couldn’t believe it apart from his disfigurement.
Nathaniel also had a difficult time, breathing and eating. However, his brain was unaffected by his condition, so he was just like any other chime. In his first year, Nathaniel had over 10 surgeries to try and improve his way of living. His parents refused cosmetic surgery on him and instead focused on improving his quality of life. One of the most difficult things Magdalen Russell had to endure was having to hear comments from other people, especially in such a big city like New York.
Nobody complimented Nathaniel and nobody congratulated them either his dad couldn’t help but admit it didn’t. Look like you were me, it didn’t look like he didn’t. Look like a person. It was that different by that time. Nathaniel was a toddler Magda and Russell wanted to try for another child.
However, it was not easy for them to carry on with their plan. Fearing their second child would also be born with Treacher Collins. The couple did several tests to ensure it wouldn’t happen and even sent their DNA samples to John Hopkins. It was then they were convinced that there was a 99 chance. Their second child would not be born with Treacher Collins.
True enough, they welcomed their second son Jacob with no complications. The proud parents likened their second son to a porcelain, doll, Nathaniel and Jacob grew close until Nathaniel started becoming conscious of his face. He noticed the stares and screams at birthday parties because children were afraid of how he looked the first time. Nathaniel realized his face was different from kids as age was when it was called a monster for years. He endured all the Judgment from other people by the age of 11.
Nathaniel had undergone 54 surgeries and he was no longer as bothered by looking different. He was able to explain his condition more effectively when he was a teenager. He had to move to an entirely different school. He made sure to send letters out to his classmates early, so they wouldn’t be surprised when they saw him for the first time to make the letter more relatable. He Incorporated the best-selling book Wonder into it.
The book is about encountering a girl who had a facial defect and how it is to live in a world that had difficulties. Accepting her looks in 2017, Wonder became a film Nathaniel credits, the film, along with his courage and his mother’s dedication, for all the wonderful transformations in his life. Inspired by their challenging Journey.
Magda wrote a book titled Normal, a mother and her beautiful son narrating their story. Likewise, Nathaniel wrote his book titled normal one kid’s Extraordinary Journey, which also tells his story from his perspective.
Through it all Nathaniel has accepted his life wholeheartedly Wonder changed the way people saw Nathaniel and made them more understanding and a lot nicer to him in school. He’s treated like everybody else, even Nathaniel’s brother Jacob saw the changes that Wonder broad.
He used to protect his mother like a bodyguard, but after the film came out. People weren’t as harsh as they used to be Nathaniel, isn’t jealous of his brother’s regular face and has learned to accept his condition. Likewise, his mother realized that God chose her out of all the people in the world to care for Nathaniel.
Through the years she chose to stay home to care for him. While Russell worked at an insurance company, she handled caring for two growing boys, while beating cancer twice the Newmans leaned on each other to get through all their medical difficulties. Now Nathaniel is proud to say he is normal, but neither is anybody else if we were all normal we’d all have to be the same.
He concluded his parents have remained his backbone through the years and they’re proud to continue supporting him in his quest for a normal life with so much support from Anna’s condition. Nowadays, it hasn’t been difficult for him to do just that.