A Bay area mother who has devoted her life to caring for her disabled son needs a new way to get him around.
Randy Singletary and his mother Joy have a special bond that goes beyond verbal communication.
It’s not because he’s a 16-year-old, that they don’t talk. He’s never been able to speak because of a birth defect that didn’t develop the nerve fibers (the corpus callosum) that connect both hemispheres of the brain.
“He wasn’t able to suck a pacifier and was very spastic at two months old,” said Joy.
The result has lead to a long list of illnesses and disabilities including, dysphasia, cerebral palsy, epilepsy and spastic quadriplegic.
Although Randy is nearly 17 years old now, he’s completely dependent on his mother’s care. Earlier this year, Randy had surgery on his spine to straighten it out. The eight hour procedure was successful, but has created an unexpected problem by making him too tall to be put in a booster seat in the family’s truck.
“He is 70 pounds, and this chair is 80 pounds," she said. "I lift him and his chair up separately.”
Joy is hoping to get a handicap accessible van but with a $40,000 to $70,000 price tag, it’s more than insurance is paying.
But that’s not stopping Joy from helping get what her son needs.
“The van is super imperative for the preservation of my back, for his safety when lifting him so the neither of us is hurt in the process.”
The family has sent up a GoFundMe page to raise money for a new van.