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No special treatment

Doctors said Lauren Weaver wouldnt walk or talk; now she has a college scholarship

Kristin Janloo Henderson
Stillwater NewsPress

When Lauren Weaver was just 10 months old, doctors said she wouldnt be able to walk or talk and that she would be learning disabled due to a mild case of cerebral palsy.

Now, about 16 years later, Weaver will enter her senior year at Stillwater High School as a state winner of the Discover Card Tribute Award.

Weaver was one of the 18,000 high school applicants across the country who applied for the award that honors high school juniors who exhibit many achievements, one of them being successfully overcoming a hardship or challenge.

Im very excited to win this award, Weaver said. When I received the letter telling me Id been chosen as a state winner, I was ecstatic.

As a state winner, Weaver will receive a $2,500 college scholarship that will go toward costs at whichever college she attends.

Weavers mild case of cerebral palsy affects her left side from her neck down. She walks with a slight limp and said her motor skills in her left hand arent good.

However, Weaver said having the disease as a child was never a factor because her mother, Lynette Erwin, would not let it be.

My mom never let me be treated as someone with a handicap, Weaver said. I was a normal child like everyone else and was to be treated like such with no allowances or special treatment.

When Erwin heard the doctors diagnosis 16 years ago, she said she thought to herself, Not my kid, because she was determined not to treat Weaver different.

Erwin remembers vividly when her daughter was younger, she wasnt meeting any of the milestones set for babies her age, such as pulling up on furniture, sitting up in the crib or walking.

To get Weaver to learn how to get up and eventually walk, Erwin said she would sit her in the middle of the living room floor and put her favorite cookie, an Oreo, in the middle of the couch, just out of reach of her daughter.

Weaver would reach for the cookie, only to come up short and end up crying herself to sleep. But just two weeks later, after doing the routine yet again, Erwin found her daughter in the living room with a huge, cookie-covered smile on her face: she had pulled herself up and got the cookie.

Ten days after that, Weaver was walking around the house.

A few years later, when Weaver was 4, she was put through IQ and cognitive and physical tests. The test results showed 4-year-old Weaver had the vocabulary of an 8-year-old and the cognitive thinking of a 12-year-old.

Erwin said her daughter simply refused to accept she would be handicapped, adding she wouldnt take any excuses.

She could do anything if she put her mind to it, Erwin said.

For Weaver to be considered for the Discover award, she must maintain a minimum 2.75 cumulative g.p.a. and also demonstrate leadership and community service. She also had to write an essay as well as get a letter of recommendation.

Weaver said she plans on completing a foreign exchange after she graduates from high school next May. When she returns, she said plans to study political science or international relations in college.

Weaver said she wants to attend a college on the east coast, applying to the College of William and Mary in Virginia, St. Johns College in Massachusetts, Yale and Harvard.

Approaching her last year in high school, Weaver is involved in numerous extra-curricular activities, including the National Honor Society, Beta Club, Young Democrats and French Club. She also is a member of the student council and plays trumpet in the marching band.

Weaver is one of the more than 500,000 Americans living with cerebral palsy, as estimated by the United Cerebral Palsy Associations.

As for winning this award in light of having cerebral palsy, Weaver said she has her mother to thank for not letting her accept any limitations in life.

I guess it goes to prove that no matter what limits others place on you, the only ones that will have any effect are the ones you accept, Weaver said.