SOMERVILLE, Mass. (WHDH) – Meet Mighty Mae. The Somerville toddler was born in 2016 with a rare lung disease that left her unable to breathe on her own.
Mae has spent most of her life in Boston-area hospitals. Determined to get her home, Mae’s parents, Maura Vogel and Courtney Koslow, decided to put her on a double lung transplant list last fall and within 30 days, Mae had a match.
“I just had this feeling of, the sense of, let’s go. This is our time and we’re bringing her home,” Vogel said.
Mae walked out of Boston Children’s Hospital and made her way home to Somerville after three weeks of recovery. Nearly a year after surgery, Mae is up and running around the house, trying to keep up with her big sister, Rosie.
The lesson in Mae’s struggle is not lost on her family. “I feel stronger for having had to open up to all of life‘s beauty and tragedy in the same moment,” Koslow said. “It is possible to embrace both of those at the same time and still come out smiling.”
Mae has to continue taking medicine to make sure her body doesn’t reject the lungs she received during the transplant. Mae’s family said they are just happy she’s back where she belongs.
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