Anthony Davis, Texarkana Gazette

Texarkana's Natalie Banks was nicknamed "Noodles" by her mother, Kimberly,
because she squirmed and wriggled "like a wet noodle."

After 10 years Kimberly, Natalie's father Greg, and brothers Greg Jr., 14,
and Cameron, 13, continue to use the nickname occasionally, but she will
always be "Noodles" to Kimberly, who has seen her courageous daughter
endure two liver transplants in her young lifetime.

Both transplants took place at Chicago Children's Hospital, roughly six years apart.

Natalie was born with biliary artesia, a liver disease in infants with no
known cause. It occurs in one in every 20,000 live births and results in
inflammation and obstruction of the ducts that carry bile from the liver to
the intestine. Fairly soon, the disease process leads to cirrhosis when
liver cells are destroyed and replaced by scar tissue.

But to see Natalie's smiling face as she sits next to Kimberly on the couch,
one wouldn't suspect that an anguishing roller-coaster ride of doubts, fears
and prayer and rejoicing had lead them to this point. Kimberly has compiled
a history of Natalie's transplant experiences that also focuses on the
reactions of herself and her husband.

Entitled "Baby Noodles-The Story of a Liver Transplant Recipient," Kimberly
has assembled a poignant, personal and spiritual guide geared to the parents
of childhood transplant recipients. It is drawn from the flux of her
experience as parent trying to find meaning and peace when confronted with a
child who will not survive without the goodness of others and the grace of
God.

"Your child has a liver disease, and she needs immediate medical attention
... like yesterday," were the doctor's words ringing in Kimberly's ears when
she took Natalie in for her 2-month infant exam. Next was one of many future
harried trips to and from Little Rock's Children's Hospital, airports,
shuttles, and cabs from Chicago to Texarkana and back.

For Kimberly, her foreseeable future would be consumed by taking meticulous
care of Natalie, spending untold hours and sometimes days in hospital
waiting rooms, bedside care and almost constant prayer.

"The doctors diagnosed her at her 2-months check-up and immediately sent her to Children's Hospital for a biopsy. It confirmed she had biliary artesia.
They put her on 13 medications and put her at the top of the donor list.
Noodles had one sickness after sickness, fever after fever and
hospitalizations, one after the other. The people in the emergency rooms
knew my name. I prayed for relief, not just for me, but for Noodles as
well," Kimberly said.

Just as Kimberly was about to reach her personal breaking point in praying
and care-giving, the call from Children's Hospital in Chicago finally came
through while the family sat in at a revival assembly. Fighting back
disorientation as to what to do next, Kimberly knew they had to get from
Texarkana to Chicago by 8 a.m. the next morning or the liver would go to
another recipient.

Greg attempted to contact LifeNet to seek their assistance. Simultaneously,
LifeNet representatives were trying to contact the Banks to volunteer a
helicopter flight to Dallas. Not fully packed and short on funds, Kimberly
and Natalie arrived at DFW airport without sufficient funds to pay for the
flight to Chicago. Not to be foiled, Kimberly prevailed upon the airlines'
ticket agent and supervisor to process the ticket on her ATM card.

And they were off to Chicago for a new liver and a new life for Natalie.
"I almost fainted when I saw Noodles for the first time after the surgery."
Kimberly writes in her memoirs. "The attending nurse apologized for not
having enough time to wash her off. She was covered with blood and with
staples running up and down her chest.

"There were all kinds of lights blinking with machines and tubes connected
to her from everywhere. She was so swollen I didn't even recognize my own
child. Just hours ago she was laughing and playing. Now, she was fighting
for her life."

Natalie was allowed to return home to Texarkana after about two months of
post-transplant recovery, during which she had the typical post-operative
problems, but no warning signs of rejection of her new liver she had
received from an organ donor.

For the next six years, life around the Banks' home gradually returned to
normal. Natalie returned to Spring Lake Park Elementary School, Cameron and
Greg Jr. continued their interests and school work and Greg Sr. completed
his training to become a minister. He has since founded his own congregation
at Daylight Christian Church, a nondenominational/Bible-based ministry for
which Greg serves as pastor.

In 2001, Natalie was seen for a routine liver biopsy because it was thought
her body might be rejecting the liver. While conducting the biopsy, a
cyst-like area was punctured, "releasing all kinds of bugs," Kimberly said.
Natalie ran a serious, spiking fever for several days and was sent back to
Chicago to address the reasons for the fever. The hospital released her back
to Texarkana. Within days Natalie and Kimberly found themselves back in
Chicago with her liver beginning to shut down.

"I felt like a yo-yo going back and back and forth. I called and left a
message with my job I was going back to Chicago. It was only four days ago
when we left Chicago, and now, we were on the way back. I wondered when I
would wake up from this horrible dream," said Kimberly.

Natalie was now old enough to know what words like "exploratory surgery"
meant, and she was frightened and nervous this time around. Doctors and
specialists came and went from her hospital room, all seeking the clue as to
how Natalie needed to be treated. Multiple tests, surgeries and intensive
care unit stays were a painful but necessary part of this search.

The next two weeks saw Natalie, still in surgical intensive care with an
open wound covered by surgical cloth, now awaiting a second transplant. She
was moved to the top of the list again and placed in a medically induced
state of paralysis so she would remain completely still.

Kimberly was again desperate and alone with her child at a time of grave
illness. She found a computer and e-mailed a "healing" prayer she had found
in a prayer book to everyone she knew. Kimberly had come to the threshold of
her physical energy and spiritual strength.

"God, I am so tired of watching Noodles suffer. Take her with You or heal
her," she pleaded for relief.