“She’s literally the strongest person that we know," says Milah Faciane's mom, Linda Huynh, of her daughter's resilience during the health crisis
Credit: Sarah Saiz Photo & Video; Courtesy of Linda Huynh and Blake Faciane in August 2024, right at Dell Children’s in May 2025
NEED TO KNOW
Key Takeaways
- When Milah Faciane was 2, she was diagnosed with a rare spinal condition typically seen in people in their 50s or 60s
- Emergency surgery and intensive rehab helped Milah regain mobility after being paralyzed from the waist down
- Her parents started Milah’s Miracle to raise awareness and funds for families affected by similar conditions
Milah Faciane spent the afternoon of May 2, 2025 playing in the sun at her father's birthday party. The then 2 -year-old ran around with other kids, played with water balloons and splashed in the inflatable pool.
But later, when the toddler woke from a nap, she didn't want her parents to put her down.
“We just thought, ‘Oh, she's tired,' ” says her father, Blake Faciane, 29, who lives in Liberty Hill, Texas, and works for a window-tinting business.
Credit: Sarah Saiz Photo & Video
When she tried to walk, Milah limped. Blake and Milah's mom, Linda Huynh, wondered if she had sprained her ankle getting in or out of the pool.
That evening, around 9 p.m., her parents took her to the emergency room at Dell Children's North. When X-rays showed nothing wrong, she was sent home.
The next morning, she wasn't even able to stand. Immediately, her parents drove her back to the hospital.
On the way, they stopped and took Milah out of her car seat to eat, and realized she couldn't even sit up on her own.
“She was leaning towards the side. She couldn't hold herself up,” says Huynh, 29, an esthetician and lash artist. “She had no balance.”
Milah was diagnosed with a spinal arteriovenous malformation (AVM), which the Mayo Clinic explains is a tangle of blood vessels that forms on or near the spinal cord. She had a dural arteriovenous fistula in the outer membrane covering the brain and spinal cord, which is extremely rare, Dr. Kevin K. Kumar, surgical director of neuro-oncology and pediatric neurosurgeon at Dell Children's Medical Center, tells PEOPLE. It's even rarer in a toddler — people typically diagnosed are typically in their 50s or 60s, according to the Mayo Clinic.
Credit: Sarah Saiz Photo & Video
The condition left her paralyzed from the waist down. Suddenly, she could not control her bladder or bowels.
“In Milah's case, time was of the essence because the longer she had a deficit, the less likely it would be to recover and be permanent," Kumar says. "So in the worst-case scenario, Mila would be permanently paralyzed, essentially below the waist and be incontinent of urine and stool. And that would be devastating." For that reason, he says, "We we wanted to move quickly.”
Milah was transferred to Dell Children Medical Center's main campus in downtown Austin.
Credit: Courtesy of Linda Huynh and Blake Faciane
Working with his partner Dr. Elias B Rizk, Kumar opened up the back of Milah's spine.
“It was a serpentine tangle all around the spinal cord,” Kumar says of the AVM.
The surgeons went “one by one within this tangle,” temporarily clipping each vessel to see if it changed the signals sent to her legs. The surgery took eight hours.
Credit: Courtesy of Linda Huynh and Blake Faciane
Afterward, Kumar told Milah's parents she would be in the hospital for about 12 weeks for rehab, undergoing inpatient occupational therapy, physical therapy and speech therapy. But she relearned so quickly that she was discharged in half the time, on June 21, 2025.
“Milah progressed so much,” Blake says.
Although she left the hospital in a wheelchair because she still couldn't walk, she soon remembered how to crawl. By September, she was able to stand up while holding onto something.
Credit: Courtesy of Linda Huynh and Blake Faciane
“It was like when she was a baby, relearning how to walk again,” her mom says.
She started taking a few steps in October, and by Halloween night, she was walking on her own as she went trick-or-treating.
Now, Milah is 3 years old, and Kumar says she's “essentially cured.” She has an annual angiogram and every five years she will have an MRI.
Credit: Courtesy of Linda Huynh and Blake Faciane
“She's really a normal kid,” her mom says.
Milah recently enrolled in KidStrong, a program to improve kids’ physical, emotional and mental skills. “She's around kids her age, and she's really able to keep up with them,” Linda says.
They urge other parents to not hesitate if they think something is wrong with their child. If Milah's parents had waited a few days thinking her leg would get better, she would have likely become permanently paralyzed.
Credit: Courtesy of Linda Huynh and Blake Faciane
Never miss a story — sign up for PEOPLE's free daily newsletter to stay up-to-date on the best of what PEOPLE has to offer, from celebrity news to compelling human interest stories.
“If we waited a day or two, she probably wouldn't still be walking now,” Blake says.
Linda adds: “Yeah. It would've been too late.”
Her parents are spreading awareness and hope for other families with AVM and have started an Instagram group, Milah's Miracle. The goal is to raise money for Dell Children's, where she was treated.
Credit: Courtesy of the Dell Children’s Foundation
“It was definitely a miracle,” her mother says. “She's literally the strongest person that we know.”
A GoFundMe was also created to help her family during her recovery.
Her father admires Milah's resilience and perseverance, from surgery to rehab to relearning life skills.
“She falls a lot,” her dad says. “But she gets right back up, and just keeps on pushing.”
Credit: Courtesy of the Dell Children’s Foundation
Read the full article here
