20-year-old Brooke Greenberg, who suffered from a rare anti-ageing condition, died looking like a toddler.
If you saw Brooke Greenberg, you'd think she was an infant when in fact she was 20 years old. Brooke, from Reisterstown, Md, suffered from a rare anti-ageing condition known as syndrome X and died from it Oct. 24. The condition is so rare that only six people in the world have been diagnosed with it so far. It made Brooke look like a six month old infant.
"While the outside world may have noticed Brooke's physical stature and been puzzled by her unique development state, she brought joy and love to her family," Rabbi Andrew Busch, who delivered the eulogy at her funeral, told the New York Daily News. "Her parents, three sisters and extended family showered her with love and respected her dignity throughout her entire life."
Right from birth, Brooke was diagnosed with several disorders, the first being a rare condition called anterior hip dislocation where she weighed just four pounds.
"Her hips were dislocated from where they normally would be," Dr. Lawrence Pakula, Brooke's pediatrician, told NBC News. "Hers were pushing forward and put her legs in a very awkward position."
Brooke's parents didn't know something was wrong with their daughter till the time Brooke's younger sister started outgrowing her. The doctor did warm them that when Brooke went to 4thgrade, she may look like she's in the first grade. However, they didn't know her condition was worse than that. Brooke was taken to many doctors and specialists but each of them was left baffled about Brooke's condition.
"They [the specialists] just said she'll catch up. Then we went to the nutritionist, the endocrinologist. We tried the growth hormone," her mother Melanie said, adding there was no change in Brooke's growth. "I mean she did not put on an ounce or she did not grow an inch. That's when I knew there was a problem."
When Brooke was 4 years old, she became very lethargic and once slept for 14 days at a stretch. Her father said they were prepared to lose their daughter and were sure she was going to die soon.
"We were preparing for our child to die," Howard Greenberg told ABC News. "We were saying goodbye. And, then, we got a call that there was some change; that Brooke had opened her eyes and she was fine. There was no tumor. She overcomes every obstacle that is thrown her way."
Brooke's parents have agreed to have their daughter's DNA sequenced by researchers at the Icahn Institute for Genomics and Multi-Scale Biology at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York to shed light on her condition.
