Volunteers bring Brooke’s wish to life

Not even the rain could wash the smile off Brooke Busher’s face when she explored her new hideaway inside and out.

Built just as she wanted, with flowered curtains to top it off, the five-year-old Leda girl grinned cheekily as she stood in her own cubby house for the first time.

As Brooke played and opened a mountain of presents, a team of teary eyed Mandurah-Rockingham branch Make-A-Wish Foundation of Australia volunteers looked on, knowing they made the little girl’s dream come true.

Unbeknown to the passerby Brooke has neurofibromatosis, a condition which is characterised by the growth of benign tumours or neurofibromas on nerve cells.

Brooke’s mother, Tanya, said her daughter suffered from tumours on her spinal cord and brain which affected her mobility, eyesight and learning capability.

“She is a happy little girl, you wouldn’t think anything is wrong with her but there is, she doesn’t know it as yet,” she said.

“I wish they could find a cure for what she’s got.”

Doctors diagnosed Brooke at age two and Miss Busher said the news came as a shock.

“So far it has been good but she can suffer learning difficulties and autism,” she said.

“She also has optic glioma (a tumour which grows on the nerve to the eye) so she is blind in her left eye.”

Miss Busher said trips to Princess Margaret Children’s Hospital were a fortnightly occurrence for medical check-ups and eye tests.

About two months ago Miss Busher said she discovered the Make-A-Wish Foundation while doing research online and decided to send off an application for her daughter.

“I didn’t think she’d be accepted but she was,” she said.

She said Brooke had always wanted a cubby house and it was a special moment when she saw her daughter’s reaction to the play zone.

“I was excited for my little girl,” she said.

“She (Brooke) had never seen anything like it so she was so excited she ran out of the car, when the car was still moving, she couldn’t wait to get out.

“I’ve never seen her so happy in her life.”

Brooke’s grandmother, Christina Vaughan, had the job of distracting Brooke while the cubby house was constructed.

“I was teary-eyed as usual, but when the builder was here, she jumped out of the car and he saw her expression and he said ‘that is a sight to remember’ and he actually had tears in his eyes,” she said.

Describing her granddaughter as loving, beautiful and cuddly, Mrs Vaughan said she would remember the look on Brooke’s face forever.

“She’s one in a million,” she said.

Mandurah-Rockingham Make-A-Wish Foundation of Australia vice-president Wendy Mills said it was hard not to get emotional when wishes were granted.

“I just love to see their faces light up when it is finished,” she said.

“This (the cubby house) is going to make her happy, this is better than inside, at the hospital, this is hers, this is where she can come to when she wants to – it is just so precious.”

Mrs Mills said Cache homes organised carpenters from Offcuts Carpentry to build the cubby house and the entire wish was sponsored by Mineral Resources.