SG. ‼️ A Fragile but Hopeful Update on 12-Year-Old Maya, Shot in the Head During a School Mass Shooting in Canada.

It has been seven days since 12-year-old Maya nearly lost her life.

Seven days since a normal school day turned into every parent’s worst nightmare. Seven days since a bullet changed the course of her childhood — and her family’s world — forever.

In the beginning, her mother says, there was no space to think. Only chaos.

The first hours and days were a blur of alarms, rushing feet, whispered consultations, and unbearable waiting. A tidal wave of fear crashed over them without warning. There were machines breathing and blinking and beeping. There were doctors speaking in careful tones. There were moments when hope felt impossibly small.

“It was a rollercoaster that hit like a tsunami,” her mother shared.

Now, one week later, everything feels different.

“Numbness… still water,” she wrote in a quiet update.

The panic has softened into something heavier — a suspended stillness. The kind that comes after the storm, when the damage is visible but the future remains uncertain.

And yet, in that stillness, there is a flicker of light.

Maya has been moved into a recovery unit.

Not a room reserved for final goodbyes.
A room meant for healing.

For her mother, that move means everything.

“To me, this is acknowledgement that she is fighting and refuses to quit.”

Those words carry the weight of a thousand emotions. Because just days ago, survival itself was not guaranteed. Doctors were focused on stabilizing her, on managing swelling, on keeping her alive hour by hour. The fact that she is now considered stable enough for recovery care feels nothing short of miraculous.

But the road ahead is far from clear.

There is still no movement on the right side of Maya’s body. Physicians say the injury mirrors the effects of a severe stroke. They have gently warned that the paralysis may be permanent — that the movement may never return.

It is a sentence no mother is ever prepared to hear.

“I would prefer to argue, of course,” she admitted honestly. “However, I don’t think I have that in me at this time…”

It is the exhaustion of someone who has already fought the fight of her life this week. The kind of exhaustion that seeps into your bones. The kind that leaves you too tired to rage — even when rage might feel justified.

And yet, despite the uncertainty, despite the devastating possibilities, her faith has not wavered.

Every day, she reads the messages that have poured in from strangers around the world. Words of encouragement. Stories of survival. Promises of prayer. Notes addressed directly to Maya.

She reads them all.

She reads them aloud to her daughter, even when Maya cannot respond. Even when there is no squeeze of a hand, no flicker of an eyelid, no whispered reply.

“Just know that the stories, the love, the support and admiration for our powerhouse of a girl is not lost,” she wrote. “I see you. We feel you.”

In a hospital room filled with wires and monitors, those words become part of the atmosphere — as real as the oxygen flowing through the tubes. They fill the space with something stronger than fear.

Maya is still here.

Still breathing.
Still fighting.
Still defying the odds that once felt insurmountable.

Her mother calls her a powerhouse — and perhaps that is exactly what she is. Not because she chose this battle, but because she continues to endure it. Because her body is still holding on. Because her story is not finished.

Recovery from a traumatic brain injury is not linear. There will be setbacks. There will be victories so small they might go unnoticed by anyone outside that hospital room — a twitch of a finger, a longer stretch of stable vitals, a sign of awareness. There will be hard conversations and long nights ahead.

But there is also this: she survived.

One week ago, doctors were fighting to keep her alive. Today, she is in a unit designed for healing.

For now, that is enough.

Her mother holds onto that truth in the quiet hours. In the numbness. In the still water.

If you could speak to a 12-year-old girl who doctors once feared would not survive — what would you say?

What words would you want taped to the walls around her hospital bed? What drawings would you send to brighten sterile white walls? What prayers would you whisper for a child who has already endured more than most adults ever will?

For those who wish to send a card, a note, or a small piece of hope her mother can hang beside her bed, you can mail it to:

Maya
Unit 304 – 827 W 16th St
North Vancouver, BC V7P 1R2
Canada

In a week defined by unimaginable darkness, Maya’s survival is a fragile but undeniable light.

And for now, that light is still shining.