At the age of just one year, Samantha Norgart was diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy, a disease that causes stiffness of muscles and muscle spasms.
Due to her condition, Samantha couldn’t speak properly until she was 21. However, all these hardships and challenges have not been enough to stop Samantha from doing something big.
The strong-willed Oregon resident has started a career in modeling and is using social media as a platform to spread the message that the sky is the only limit.
Meet Samantha in the video below.
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Video credit: Rumble
Twenty-two-year-old Samantha, known on the social media as ‘@wheelchairblondie,’ spoke to Barcroft TV about her life and career.
She told them: “Most people assume because I’m in a wheelchair my mind doesn’t work. But it does. At the end of the day, you just have to live and have no fear and no regrets.”
While her sister Sophie added: “Samantha always wants to do anything, she always wants to try something new. She’s very adventurous, optimistic, and open-minded. She doesn’t judge anyone.
“I think her modeling is perfect for her. She started working with organizations and brands, and at first we thought maybe it was a bit of fun.
“But now it’s getting more serious to where she’s getting agencies contacting her and wanting to her even start traveling, so it’s pretty cool.”
Obviously, achieving all this has not been an easy thing for Samantha. Just to aid in her movement and posture, the girl had to undergo three surgeries.
Samantha’s mom Denise also had a hard time nursing her as she had no control over her body movements.
At the age of nine, Samantha had her first surgery in the hope of correcting the way she walked.
Denise said: “When she would try to walk she would cross her legs over each other because her muscle was too tight. So, they had to go in and loosen it. Just snip it a little bit.”
Samantha then had to undergo another surgical procedure on her spine at an age of 16 but the surgery failed as the hardware couldn’t properly adhere to her bones.
The procedure had to be repeated a year later.
Denise added: “That was very scary. As a mum, for me, I didn’t have time to be weak and freak out and be emotional because I needed to be strong for everybody else and her.”
Just two years following all this trouble, arthritis in spinal disks caused Samantha to have severe backache and doctors had to operate her once more to extend the rods that supported her back to the far end of her spine.
After all the surgeries at the age of 21, Samantha was able to talk for the first time in her life after doctors applied a patch of Scopolamine on her skin to prevent her feelings of nausea.
“I couldn’t keep anything down for like three days,” said Samantha. “Because of this patch, now I can talk. It was great, it was so great to finally have my independence.”
While her mom recalled: “We were at Shriners Hospital she was in her hospital bed. She started talking and it just took my breath away.
“I was trying to get my head around all this because I’m thinking ‘wait a minute how is this possible? Why now?’
“I feel like it’s a miracle in my eyes. I feel there was a reason why they gave her this patch instead of those dissolving pills that she had before for nausea. It’s just crazy.”
Sophie added: “We were just really shocked and we started like calling people.
“I remember we called my grandma and we were just like ‘Grandma listen to this’ and Samantha was like ‘Hi, how are you doing?’ and my grandma was just in awe.”
The remarkable improvement in Samantha’s condition made the doctors think that her initial diagnosis of Cerebral Palsy was not correct.
However, they’ve not yet been able to identify exactly what is the base of her disease. Until the final diagnosis of her condition, Samantha is using the Scopolamine patch.
Her genetic testing has not revealed anything out of the ordinary and hence the case is an undiagnosed research problem waiting to be solved.
Samantha is spending her time modeling around Oregon city with a number of photographers, most notably Bill Lind from Cobalt Studios PDX in Portland.
“Samantha is an amazing soul and an amazing model,” said Lind.
“We have fallen in love with her at the studio and she’s really become a big part of our world of inclusiveness, to make sure that everybody who wants to be behind or in front of the camera is included.
“She literary will stand there and go ‘Leave me here, get the shot, I don’t care if I fall.’ And it scares us but, we’ve kind of factored in the falling thing.
“We’ve always kind of made fun of it, that’s the fun of it, but she’s very confident in that way that for her, it’s more important to get the shot than the fear of falling.”
Samantha has managed to achieve all of it despite the fact that she needs a caregiver to get up, change clothes, go to the washroom and to even eat.
Her mom said: “I am very proud of her modeling and how she’s gone about doing it herself and not waiting around for somebody to hold her hand.
“She is a go-getter and she will get this world to look at people with disabilities in a different way.”
Samantha added: “I want to say to anyone struggling with a physical condition that you’re no different than an able-bodied person. You have to keep strong.
“I’ve been talking for one year now, so anything is possible when you have a positive mindset.”
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