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Overcoming hardships: how a single mother at the University of Toledo discovered her vocation to help others

Frances Bradford

Anna Neller sits with her six-year-old twin sons, Ethan and Jacob, who were diagnosed in 2011 with pituitary dwarfism, a medical condition that hinders a child’s normal growth. As a result, Neller is dedicated to helping families with growth disorders and those who’ve been oppressed. She is pursuing her master’s degree in sociology with a concentration in medical sociology and disability.

Samantha Rhodes, Managing Editor

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She’s 27 years old with one bachelor’s degree under her belt, a master’s degree in the works and a story that never sought to be told, but deserves to be.

What makes Anna Neller different from the other 20,625 students enrolled at the University of Toledo this semester? For one, she’s a nontraditional student — but that barely scratches the surface.

Growth hormone deficiency, also known as pituitary dwarfism — a medical condition where the pituitary gland doesn’t produce enough growth hormone for a child to develop and grow at a normal rate — occurs in an estimated 1 in 3,800 live births, according to the UK Child Growth Foundation.

Despite these odds, Neller’s 6-year-old twin sons, Ethan and Jacob, both suffer from pituitary dwarfism and are now on growth hormone therapy.

However, Neller’s journey toward finding a diagnosis for her sons was far from smooth. Rather, she said it proved to be one of the greatest obstacles in her life.

“On their first birthdays, they only weighed 14 pounds each,” Neller said. “Despite following the physicians’ dietary orders, they remained extremely small for their ages. In fact, they were categorized as a ‘-2 standard deviation’ on the growth charts.”

At the same time in 2009, they were both diagnosed with ‘failure to thrive’ and ‘poor muscle tone,’ causing them to need both occupational and speech therapy. At the time, Neller was working full time and taking prerequisite courses at Owen’s Community College for nursing school.

Her sons were unable to gain weight or maintain steady growth. She found that many health professionals were “extremely apathetic” toward her concerns and some suspected her of child neglect and maltreatment. Other doctors even misdiagnosed her sons, failing to complete all the proper testing and disregarding her opinions.

“To be candid, I felt very isolated and that my health care resources were beginning to deplete,” Neller said. “In addition to the lack of support from health care professionals, I was a single parent working full time and trying to obtain a college degree.”

When her sons were properly diagnosed at age three in March 2011, Neller had already decided she wanted to help others who found themselves in her same seemingly helpless situation. She knew she wanted to pursue something in the field of science, but she didn’t enjoy the clinical aspects of nursing, like giving shots or administering medicine.

Instead, she wanted to take the science and sociology behind medical and disability studies and apply those theories on a social scale with a focus on patient rights.

“With medical sociology, you’re looking at the realm of medicine and how societal groups interact with one another within that culture and within the healthcare professions,” Neller said. “It’s not so much just your social class, but a continuum of factors that affect health, such as age, education, wealth, diversity.”

Consequently, she earned her bachelor’s degree from UT in Interdisciplinary Studies in spring 2013 and decided to pursue her master’s degree in Aug. 2014, majoring in sociology with a concentration in medical sociology and disability.

She aims to graduate in 2016, get her Ph.D and become a professor at a university teaching medical sociology.

To further prove her dedication for her cause, Neller holds a plethora of titles, one being the outreach coordinator for the MAGIC Foundation, a patient advocacy non-profit organization devoted to the support and education of families with children facing medical challenges that affect their growth.

She also serves as the graduate editor for the America Sociological Association Newsletter, a quarterly online publication, where she writes stories and maintains her own column.

Neller has even co-authored two encyclopedia entries and published two reviews in scholarly journals, her work ranging from the history of diseases to new genetics research and even patient autonomy studies.

Despite her growing list of achievements, Neller humbly said she feels she isn’t that extraordinary. She says the key to being exceptional is to look at each increment of progress individually, take only one step at a time and try not to make any excuses.

“Do the best you can in each small section,” Neller said. “It’s not just how intelligent you are…it’s your survival skills, your interpersonal skills and your steadfast spirit to never give up.”

When describing Neller, phrases like “go-getter,” a “shining star,” “natural encourager” and “extraordinary student,” popped up numerous times in conversations with Jamie Harvey, co-founder of the MAGIC Foundation, and Leslie Meyer, a UT success coach in the College of Adult and Lifelong Learning who advised Neller before she applied to graduate school. Both women shared that they were truly inspired by Neller and her never-ceasing passion for her work.

“Anna loves learning and has such a strong work ethic,” Meyer said. “She’s not intimidated by hard work. Rather, she is willing to put forth the effort. She is someone who puts her heart and soul into everything she does, including being a mother, student, employee, daughter, friend, et cetera.”

Harvey praised Neller’s efforts and said she is “living and exemplifying true philanthropy and outreach at its purest and most honorable form.”

“She [Neller] is so compassionate for those families out there who are searching for answers for their children that she volunteers hours and hours to help children who she may never meet, but will change their lives and lifetimes,” Harvey said.

In fact, the need to make a difference is so deeply ingrained in Neller that she said every hardship she’s experienced so far was necessary to get her where she is now.

“It’s challenging, it’s rigorous, but it’s definitely worth it,” Neller said. “It’s part of me and I won’t feel satisfied until I have it done. It’s not just some type of goal. I want to help people who’ve been oppressed, who’ve had their human rights violated, in any way possible.”

Aside from keeping her sons healthy, her top personal priority is teaching them to be compassionate and open-minded.

“You never really know a person’s life story,” Neller said. “You may look at someone and say they’re homeless because of the choices they made, but you never really know because there’s so many other factors.”

Because she considers herself a spiritual person, Neller said it all comes back to the grace of God and personal attitude.

“It’s the grace of God that you’re at where you’re at,” Neller said. “Anyone can be homeless, anyone can be uneducated. It comes with your circumstances and environment. The only thing you can control is your attitude on a day-to-day basis and the personal actions you choose, but any type of situation can arise in anyone’s life. It’s important to always know that and to be grateful.”

In her spare time, Neller enjoys yoga and walking, both of which allow her to clear her mind. Because her favorite quote stems from the ancient philosopher, Socrates, she admits that her mind is often filled with self-reflection.

“‘The unexamined life is not worth living,’” Neller said with a smile. “I like that because, I mean, that’s me. You have to examine, do a self-inventory of yourself and other people. Things aren’t just one dimensional; there’s multi-dimensions and the only way you’re going to figure it out is by self-reflection.”

If one thing is for sure, it’s that Neller definitely has things figured out — or at least, she’s exactly where she wants to be, sharing the compassionate attitude she wants to spread and inspiring countless others along the way.

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