Dear Angels and Angel Parents, I am Frankie Milley the founder of Meningitis Angels and the mother of Heaven Bound Angel Ryan Milley.

Click on Ryan to meet him.

Ryan was our only child. He was 18 years old, just graduated high school, pursuing a pro-golf career and getting ready for college.

He became ill on Father's Day June 21, 1998. His only complaint was an earache and he had a fever. In less than 14 hours he developed hemorrhaging under the skin (the rash) and he lay on an emergency room table with blood coming from every orifice of his body. He never had a stiff neck or headache. I could only tell him don't be afraid, Bear, I love you. His dad repeated over and over "Daddy loves you baby boy." Ryan coded, his heart stopped and a few seconds later his heart started long enough for Ryan to smile and mouth the words "I know." Ryan died with Meningococcal Meningitis/Meningococcemia, group C. Within 48 hours of his death I heard about MENOMUNE, a vaccine that could have saved Ryan's life. For years our military have been vaccinated against this disease. Yet our children have been left to be debilitated or killed by this disease.

First I grieved. This disease had taken away the love of our life and my identity. Our right to be parents at a wedding, the right to hold a grand child and be called grandma and Pa Pa. The right of a child's comfort in our old age or support when one of us has to leave the other.

Then I became angry not at God, He had allowed our baby to die with dignity, but at a disease that could have been prevented by a harmless vaccine, that no one had ever told me about. "Our precious boy did not have to die."

Then I got busy. I began to work with other parents around the country. We met with the Aventis Team, the makers of MENOMUNE. We educated ourselves on the disease and the vaccine. I visited with parents and angels in the hospital and their homes to offer support, information, and resources for help on this disease and vaccines for it. I became part of a national support team for the Meningitis America Foundation. I joined with other Angel parents. Each of us, started legislative procedures in our own states for more education and protection of our children and young adults. The Gardeners, of Maryland, who lost their son Jesse were the first.

I assisted with mass vaccinations in a meningitis outbreak in our community, and the Houston area.

In less than a week I collected over 5,000 signatures, with the help of my husband and  friends, to expand Texas Senate Bill 31 authored by Senator Zaffirini,  The expansion would  extend this education bill from college students to include all school children and their parents.  Joining with other  parents, friends and family across Texas we worked hard  for the passing of  this Bill. Becoming one of the fastest bills ever passed, it was signed into law May 22, 2001, by Governor Rick Perry.

Texas became the first state to have such a law. This was not enough.

My heart still hurts for all the children and young adults who have fallen
victim and who would still fall victim to this deadly disease.

May 2001 a dream came true and Meningitis Angels Heaven and Earth Bound, INC. was founded.

With the help of other Angel Parents, Wendy and Jodie Meigs, parents of Earth Bound Angel Leslie, Linda and Terry Ott, parents of Heaven Bound Angel Mason, friends, and family, Meningitis Angels is no longer a dream but a reality. It is the first of its kind. It is our prayer to give hope to children and adults, who feel they have none, because of the devastation of this disease.

Someone once wrote

"It is when we forget ourselves that we are able to do things that are remembered."

God has allowed me to take a painful, forever broken heart and a loss that no one should have to bear and turn it in to a life filled with compassion, love, hope and service for your angels. We are a young foundation with even more dreams and hopes for the future. We are blessed with a board of directors and support staff that volunteer their time, money and talents.

A mother who lost her child wrote,

"Bright is the light that lights the path no longer traveled."

Our Heaven Bound Angels, light a path they no longer travel, a path for our Earth Bound Angels to find their way and protect others from this deadly disease.

Help me to make Meningitis Angels an organization that makes dreams come true and places a rainbow where there has been a storm.

You can make a difference.

God Bless You,
Frankie Milley, founder and president of Meningitis Angels,
Ryan's Mom.