{"id":9500,"date":"2022-04-08T11:16:44","date_gmt":"2022-04-08T01:16:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/?p=9500"},"modified":"2022-04-08T12:27:59","modified_gmt":"2022-04-08T02:27:59","slug":"milla-doesnt-think-twice-with-three-legs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/milla-doesnt-think-twice-with-three-legs\/","title":{"rendered":"Milla doesn’t think twice with three legs"},"content":{"rendered":"

Words:<\/strong>\u00a0Brigid O\u2019Connell
\nPhoto:<\/strong>\u00a0Alex Coppel<\/p>\n

There is a towering tree at Milla Gooch\u2019s kindergarten that is named after her.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"\"
Milla Gooch, 8, with her sporty prosthetic leg, as well as all of her older legs as she has grown.
Picture: Alex Coppel.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Each year when a new group of children begin, daunted by what they can achieve, teachers tell them the story of their star bush kinder graduate who \u2013 with a prosthetic leg \u2013 has been one of the only ones to climb this giant tree. If Milla can do it, so can they, the kids are told.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverywhere we go people are just amazed by her, but I see it every day so sometimes I have to step back and reflect that she\u2019s so independent, happy and confident,\u201d mum Brooke said.<\/p>\n

It was a daunting decision to follow the advice of Royal Children\u2019s Hospital orthopedic surgeons and have their 11-month-old daughter\u2019s right leg amputated after she was born without a shin bone and ankle.<\/p>\n

Doctors assured Brooke and husband Shane that despite this rare congenital abnormality called tibial hemimelia, they would be amazed at what their daughter would achieve with a prosthetic leg. And they were not wrong.<\/p>\n

Milla, now aged eight and a frequent flyer at the RCH for regular check-ups to keep her body strong, has recently been fitted with three new legs. She now has her first waterproof swimming leg, an athletic blade and an upgraded everyday leg.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s changed her pace so she can keep up with the other kids,\u201d Ms Gooch said. \u201cShe\u2019s riding a bike, she has started soccer and participating in the school cross country \u2026 She doesn\u2019t think twice about it. She just has a go.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Thanks to your generous support, we can make a difference to children like Milla and support world-leading care at the RCH. Click here to donate today to the Good Friday Appeal.<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Three prosthetic legs see eight-year-old Milla running, swimming and enjoying everyday life. Click here to read her story. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":229,"featured_media":9504,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8971,7198,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9500","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-featured","category-good-friday-appeal","category-in-the-news"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9500","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/229"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9500"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9500\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9507,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9500\/revisions\/9507"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9500"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9500"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.rch.org.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9500"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}