Shelly: Nick is 34 inches tall.
So he's two and a half feet.
Today we're celebrating a milestone,
today is Nick's 28th birthday.
Nick: Snowball fight.
Shelly: We didn't even know that we would have him for 28 years.
And we don't know if we'll have them for 29.
We're heading to Patti Cakes house,
for Nick’s 28th birthday celebration.
Interviewer: Nick so are you excited about your party today?
Nick: Uh huh. Interviewer: How old are you turning today?
Nick: Um 15.
Shelly: No, 20 … Nick: 28.
Shelly: We're going to have a good day.
We got some friends coming over,
so it'll be a neat thing for all of us just to get together.
Nick: Yeah. Interviewer: Who else is going to be
at your party today?
Nick: All my friends.
And my girlfriend too.
Shelly: What’s your girlfriend’s name? Nick: Carly.
Shelly: I don’t know if we sent her an invite, did we?
Nick: Yeah I did, I sent an invite to her.
Shelly: When we started planning
it was supposed To be 65 and we were going to,
have a bouncy house and all this good stuff.
And then today we got the snow so it's crazy.
It hasn’t snowed in Georgia like in two years,
and here it is Nick's birthday.
Shelly: The white stuff is getting on us hurry.
Nick: Yeah. Shelly: What is this stuff?
Did you tell it to snow on your birthday party?
Nick: No. Shelly: Did you order this stuff?
Nick: No it happened. Patti: It just happened?
Nick: Yeah. Shelly: So we're going to have fun,
and who knows maybe few snowball fights.
Nick has a condition.
It's called MOPDII,
Microcephaly Osteodysplastic Primordial Dwarfism.
It is a very rare type of dwarfism.
So Nick is below average in his size,
and will always be smaller than most people with dwarfism.
His organs and everything are symmetrically small.
So everything is kind of proportional.
I think he's definitely one of the oldest
and maybe one of the smallest still with this condition.
Nick, so this is your Ikea of spare bedroom, isn't it?
Nick: Yeah great, great. Shelly: So you come and hang out here.
Patti: You take that room honestly. Shelly: This is where you sleep?
Nick: Look I got a phone.
Shelly: Who’s calling?
Nick's mentality is very much childlike
I think its almost protected him.
He doesn't really have a sense of time,
he doesn't really have a sense of forever.
So I think in that way it's protected him to
be able to be joyful and not have,
to worry about what's going to happen.
Patti: So I’ve known Nick for probably 20 plus years,
he just instant you know, personality.
Everything just to instant connection. Did it come out?
Nick: Yeah. Patti: Yea. Who is that?
Nick: You. Patti: Who’s, is this your favorite person?
Nick: Yeah. Patti: In the whole wide world?
Nick Yeah. Patti: What do you call me now?
Nick: Skinny girl. Patti: Skinny girl. I like that.
Shelly: He loves to talk to people. He's always talking to somebody.
He's always flirting with somebody.
Nick: I brushed my teeth.
Patti: You brushed your teeth I’m glad.
Why do you think you're going to kiss girls?
Nick: Yeah. Shelly: Nick is a ladies man.
He does like girls. He's, if you're out in the store,
he's looking over and he’s walk over to them to say I shave.
And then to show them the muscles.
He's a charmer. Nick: Siri do you love me?
Siri: Of course. Nick: See?
Patti: She does.
Shelly: To be born into my family where, you know,
my ex husband is 6 '8, and my boys are 6 '5 and I'm 5 '8.
And then we got Nick and I said
God had a good sense of humor when he made my family.
His brothers are so good with him.
As you can tell, he just love spending time with his brothers.
Patti: Who is your favorite brother? Nick: Levi.
Patti: Oh you’re going to say Travis when he gets here?
Nick: I don’t know Trav.
Travis: Who you texting Nick? Nick: My girlfriend.
Travis: Always. Come here. Shelly: Say hi to your brother.
Patti: Did you get that hat today? Nick: Yeah.
Travis: What’s up man? Nick: Good.
Travis: Sure. Celebrating Nick's birthday,
is just always a great thing.
Just celebrating his life, and him being here with us.
Nick: Snowball fight. Travis: Another snowball fight.
Nick: Yeah. Travis: Thanks a lot.
Shelly: I worry about Nick’s future every day.
I really do. I worry about a small cold that might,
end up with something worse.
Nick has done everything more than the doctors could even imagine.
I mean, they didn't think Nick would ever walk.
They didn't think you'd ever talk.
Everything that Nick has done had to be learned.
Whatever came easy for somebody else,
Nick had to try 500 times over to learn it.
Nick will always be in my nest,
I will always be his mama bear and i'll always have that mama role.
So it's like having that boy that never grew up.
It's a beautiful child to have.
Nick’s medical future is, I think really good.
He's healthy. He had scoliosis so he had back surgery,
and then he's had three major brain [inaudible] surgeries.
We are you know, staying on top of everything that we can.
We've been very well educated.
We know what comes with this syndrome.
What to you know, monitor and watch. 1, 2, 3.
Nick: Levi’s a girl.
Travis: Turn it down. Nick: Make me Trav! Make me.
Shelly: He’s just full of life and just has that bubbly personality.
Shelly: Whenever we're having a bad day,
just he’ll come up with a joke or he will
talk about something going on in his life,
and it just kind of puts everything into perspective for you.
Don't worry about much because you see Nick,
and you see what he's gone through.
Happy birthday to you.
Shelly: Having Nick has changed my life
like I could never have predicted.
He is happy. He is loving.
If you just never have felt love like Nick's love.
Did you have fun on your birthday? Nick: Yeah.
Awesome. Nick: Yeah.