It all started last March. I was looking out the window while driving to a regular doctor appointment. It was a gloomy morning. I looked at the road and saw all the cows and farms on the country road that led me to the doctor’s office.

My name is Juliana Ruggiero. I’m eighteen and have Spastic Cerebral Palsy. My story begins in 1999. I was a fragile preemie who weighed only 3.10 pounds. My parents were not able to hold me. Instead, I was taken away to the NICU. I was on a breathing machine and closely monitored by a team of doctors until I was stable enough and my lungs were developed enough to function on their own.