IN­NIS FRAN­CIS

Camille Par­ris-Hinds views her three-year-old daugh­ter Cyd­ni's phys­i­cal chal­lenges as a gift from God. Each time she looks in­to Cyd­ni's face, joy fills her heart.

Cyd­ni, who turned three on Au­gust 17, was born with a con­gen­i­tal con­di­tion, and one of her legs is short.

De­spite the rar­i­ty of her con­di­tion and the chal­lenges as­so­ci­at­ed with it, her par­ents have em­braced it with love.

“One in every two hun­dred thou­sand women gives birth to a child with this dis­or­der,” Par­ris-Hinds said in an in­ter­view with Guardian Me­dia.

To raise aware­ness about Cyd­ni's con­di­tion and help gen­er­ate funds for her to lead a nor­mal life, Camille and her hus­band, Cedel Hinds, launched a book ti­tled Cyd­ni's Spe­cial Leg at Pre­sen­ta­tion Col­lege in San Fer­nan­do last month.

“This six-page glossy book is de­signed to ed­u­cate par­ents and chil­dren about the con­di­tion,” Par­ris-Hinds ex­plained. “It cov­ers every­thing from ear­ly child­care to preschool and be­yond.”

As teach­ers, she and her hus­band be­lieve it is es­sen­tial to share their daugh­ter’s sto­ry so she can nav­i­gate life along­side her peers.

Par­ris-Hinds re­count­ed her preg­nan­cy, which she had ini­tial­ly an­tic­i­pat­ed to be with­out com­pli­ca­tions.

Not want­i­ng to have any dif­fi­cul­ties in the pub­lic hos­pi­tal, she opt­ed for pri­vate care. “I was all set for pri­vate care. I had heard so many hor­ror sto­ries,” she ex­plained.

Par­ris-Hinds said a doc­tor friend en­cour­aged her to get check­ups at a hos­pi­tal, and that was when she made a strange dis­cov­ery.

“De­spite un­der­go­ing nu­mer­ous ul­tra­sounds, it wasn’t un­til my hos­pi­tal vis­it that they de­tect­ed the short­er limb. It was just a week be­fore I gave birth,” she re­called.

Re­flect­ing on the rev­e­la­tion, Par­ris-Hinds said she found so­lace in the tim­ing.

“I think I would have dwelled on it a bit too much if I knew be­fore. I think God put things in a way that life could be dif­fer­ent. I don’t know what men­tal space I would have been in at that mo­ment; three or four weeks in­to know­ing I may have said, ‘I don’t want this child any­more,’ you nev­er know what would be go­ing through my head. I may have gone in­to a state of de­pres­sion,” she added.

She said a week be­fore her ba­by was born, she was in a very pos­i­tive space. “Hav­ing the sup­port of my hus­band, I was able to say this is my child, and I got to do what I got to do,” Par­ris-Hinds said. 

Par­ris-Hinds had ini­tial­ly aimed to work with spe­cial needs chil­dren while study­ing at the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, as she was in­flu­enced by her broth­er, who has cere­bral pal­sy.

“I al­ways dreamed of help­ing kids with spe­cial needs,” she said, re­call­ing her project de­sign­ing fur­ni­ture for chil­dren with dis­abil­i­ties.

“Now, I re­alise the Lord placed this child in my life to ful­fil that dream every day,” she added.

Now, as a proud moth­er, she said her joy over­flows when she wit­ness­es Cyd­ni's re­mark­able spir­it.

“I am amazed by her ca­pa­bil­i­ties,” Par­ris-Hinds ad­mit­ted. “I nev­er ex­pect­ed we would reach this stage. At first, I wor­ried she might need a wheel­chair or a walk­ing stick. But see­ing her re­ceive her first pros­thet­ic leg gave me hope. I know she will con­quer the world.”

Af­ter shar­ing Cyd­nis’ jour­ney, the fam­i­ly found sup­port from for­mer Par­a­lympic swim­mer Shan­ntol Ince and Miss Uni­verse Wendy Fitzwilliam, who reached out, pledg­ing as­sis­tance for Cyd­ni's needs.

“Wendy even promised an­oth­er pros­thet­ic leg for her,” Par­ris-Hinds said, grate­ful for the kind­ness of oth­ers.

At the book launch, each copy sold for $100, with pro­ceeds go­ing to­ward Cyd­ni's on­go­ing ex­pens­es, in­clud­ing phys­io­ther­a­py and med­ical care.

“We want to en­sure she has every op­por­tu­ni­ty to thrive,” Par­ris-Hinds de­clared. With every step Cyd­ni takes, Par­ris-Hinds said she feels a re­newed sense of pur­pose.

“I don’t know how to put in­to words the emo­tions I feel,” she said, tears in her eyes.

“Cyd­ni re­stores my faith every day. She is my lit­tle war­rior,” she added.