MINNEAPOLIS — It is one of life's time-honored truths.
Kids lose stuff.
Usually it's money, a shoe, a favorite sweatshirt or a house key. Losing them is inconvenient, or emotionally upsetting, but nothing that will keep a child (or their parents) from falling asleep at night.
There are exceptions, like the thing 7-year-old Phoebe Harrison lost in Hopkins Sunday – an item that connects her to the world around her in an almost magical way. It's a story about something that was lost, and almost miraculously... found. The humanity that showered down on Phoebe and her family between the two is what will stay with them.
Phoebe and her mom, former KARE 11 reporter Lindsey Seavert, had attended a show with friends at Stages Theater in Hopkins and stopped to play at nearby Maetzold Park afterward. Lindsey says her daughter took off her cochlear implant - a device that helps her hear after being born with single-sided deafness – before climbing on the monkey bars.
Neither can remember what happened with it after that, but assumed they put it back on her head immediately, a practice they've honored since her implant surgery 2 1/2 years ago. Only later did they realize the cochlear implant was gone. It could have fallen off while Phoebe was playing on the equipment, or Lindsey says she may have lost the device while holding it. Whatever the case, she returned to the park and retraced their steps between there and the parking garage.
Nothing.
Stressed out and bummed about Phoebe's implant being lost, Seavert left a post on Facebook Monday sharing their story and asking people to keep their eyes open for Phoebe's all-important electronic device. As of Tuesday, she reports it has not been located... but what has been found, is a reaffirmed faith in humanity.
Lindsey says in the hours following her post, the family was overwhelmed with kindness and people's willingness to help. She shared that a man named Mike Pavlik logged nine miles Monday night, searching the park and surrounding field with a flashlight. Another good samaritan, Scotty Thiry, went out with a metal detector in hopes of finding Phoebe's implant. More than 160 people shared the post with friends in hopes of a happy ending.
"We might not find it, but the goodness of people is so amazing," Seavert shared in a message to KARE 11. "We discovered something else along the way - Phoebe told me this morning that it felt like a fairytale with all the people helping her."
On Tuesday afternoon, the fairytale was completed with a happy, but unexpected ending.
A mother of a child with a cochlear implant whom Lindsey had previously encountered at a park saw the post and took her two kids out to search for Phoebe's lost implant. After hours of searching, the implant was eventually found in a pile of leaves near a Snoopy statue by the theater.
Truly a needle in a haystack.
In a follow-up post Wednesday, Lindsey laid out a heartfelt thank you to BreeAnn Rumsch and her kids Olivia and Leo. She said when the two families reunited at the spot where they found Phoebe's implant, Olivia was over the moon to tell us how she saw it in the dirt, purple unicorns peeking out.
Leo wanted to share his story about how he once lost his implant playing in the ball pit at Urban Air. Lindsey said the kids quickly connected, then ran and played together while the adults marveled over this whole miracle.
"How else do you explain it? I believed in everyday miracles before but this reinforces that we meet people for a reason," Lindsey wrote. "People just want to help, we are wired to show up in an hour of need."
In her post, Seavert also extended thanks to the Hopkins, MN Community Page, Hopkins police, the local Elks Lodge and all those who took the time to share her original Facebook page and help raise awareness of the lost cochlear implant.
"A resounding message for a little girl who might need help hearing but has listened intently with wonder of what this story in her life reveals," Lindsey concluded. "The world is scary and devastating right now, but what a reminder that goodness is right around the corner. In the smallest of packages. It is in the dirt and the messiest of places. In Phoebe’s words, 'It feels like a fairy tale. And — a TV show!'”
A bit of background on Phoebe's story: she was born with what is known as single-sided deafness, which impacted Phoebe's ability to hear and speak. In 2020, when she was five years old, Phoebe was one of the first kids in Minnesota to receive a cochlear implant for single-sided deafness after the device was approved by the FDA for use by kids like her. Now age 7, Phoebe is in first grade, and talks to everyone she can about her implant to raise awareness about hearing loss.
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