As writen by his father:

Atiq Wazif – This is his story. Hasan is an entrepreneur and Dora is a school teacher. It was January 2000 and the couple was expecting to have their 4th child. The date was January 22nd 2000. Just like any other parents, my wife and I were overjoyed when our son was born. We named him "Atiq Wazif" which has a meaning of "hardworking". Forty days after he was born, we rushed him to a hospital when he was having difficulty in breathing. Thus, it marked the beginning of our long hard struggle to bring up Wazif, our gifted child.

It was 4am on the 3rd day Wazif was hospitalized. I was still working on my laptop, as during the day I was in the hospital accompanying Wazif. My other three children curled sleeping soundly inside the sleeping bag. My phone rang and it was my wife. She asked me to come to the hospital urgently. "Wazif turned blue" she said. When I got to the hospital, Wazif was motionless, wired-up to all the machines. All I could hear was the beeping of these entire strange machines to keep Wazif alive. All I could do was watched and prayed.

After three weeks, Wazif was discharged. He was very weak and we had to care for him full time. It was taxing and time consuming. However, in the process we learned a lot of lessons.

For the next 3 years, there were many more trips to the hospitals. There were genetics test, ECG, MRI, Hearing test, Vision test, Nerve test, Urine sample, Blood sample etc. We had to make a visit to the hospitals once every 2 weeks, with several hospitalization, thus hospital was our second home. There were many complications that lead to several surgeries and operations. There were two times during the hospitalization period that we thought that we may have lost him. The only things left for us to do were pray and plead to God that our son would survive. In both occasions, God answered our prayer.

After spending for more than 36 months at the Kuala Lumpur General Hospitals, with more than 30 testing procedures, we were still clueless on the cause of Wazif condition. Nevertheless we continued with the treatment that we could afford to help Wazif to become as normal as he could.

After not getting any significant improvement on the treatment locally, we decided to go abroad. Some good friend of us who is a Pediatrician at one of the Specialist Hospital in Petaling Jaya recommended Beijing. We did not have enough money to go for the treatment, but we sacrificed whatever that we had to pay for the treatment. We made some contacts and were put to Dr. Mao from Erkang Beijing Hospitals. We got a lot of help from the Jackson & Ashita family prior and upon our arrival in Beijing. We just could not thank them on their kindness in assisting us throughout our one year stay in Beijing. Throughout the therapy session, Wazif went through a lot of pain, with acupuncture, massage, needles, and rigorous physiotherapy. There were times that I just could not stand it that I had to hide myself in a room, deep down inside me I was crying.

It was during the 3rd month of our stay in Beijing. My wife had gone back to KL to take care of our other kids. As usual in the morning, I would hold Wazif hand and slowly he would take one step forward, and then stop. This one fine day, I let go both of his hand, he was trembling, wobbling, he was terrified, but then he paused. Wazif looked at me, standing and trying to balance himself. Suddenly he lifted his left leg and took one step forward, then right leg, another step forward. I froze. Then Wazif was waving uncontrollably. He got so excited. He crushed onto a flower trees, laughing and giggling. I was just standing there, what a miracle! My vision became blurred, eyes moistured. I was crying. That was the day that after 4.5 years, my son took his first step.

As of October 2006, Wazif has started to walk although still very much unstable. He occasionally uttered “mama” and “papa... papa”. We are looking forward to have Wazif to undergo intensive pediatric physiotherapy at the Therapies4kids Inc and we appreciate any financial assistance given to us. I strongly believe that given the opportunity to go for this treatment, Wazif would be able to achieve independence. I think he deserve that chance. Thank you.

Hasan Suyut
October 2006, Kuala Lumpur.