Gloria Alexandre is a star at North Miami Middle School and Nicklaus Children’s Hospital.

She has a scrapbook filled with certificates for citizenship and achievement in science. She has trophies and medals for making honor roll, learning English and a stellar sixth-grade year. She would’ve had more if she didn’t have to miss her seventh-grade graduation.

The 13-year-old wears her accomplishments, too. That’s why she also has a certificate for being a “brave kid” at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital.

There is an eight-inch scar down her back where she had a mass the size of a grapefruit removed. Another six-inch carving goes across her torso. Even the ones she’s outgrown, she still keeps: a wheelchair, speckled leg braces and special pink-and-blue shoes she no longer needs.

“That’s a memory,” she says with a smile.

In many ways, Alexandre is a typical middle-schooler. She loves Beyoncé and her purple-cased smartphone. But it is her resilience that makes her extraordinary.

Gloria has a genetic disorder known as achondroplasia dwarfism that causes a host of problems. She is recovering from five surgeries and trying to live as normal a life as she can while her family struggles to survive in North Miami.

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Marie Paula Alexandre, 42, left behind her husband and son in Port-au-Prince in 2016 so she could seek better care for Gloria. Schools were closed and life was grim in Haiti.

“She’s very strong,” Alexandre said of her daughter. “She works hard.”

Gloria’s precocious younger brother, Robsen, now 10, came over in 2017. Her father, Robert, 50, came just before her first surgery in December 2018. Gloria and Robsen sleep on a bunk bed next to the living room in the family’s one-bedroom apartment in North Miami.

“This is my exceptional, exceptional child,” said Robert. “I love her.”

Gloria had surgery on her throat that month, followed by her stomach. Then she had three surgeries on her back, stomach and spine all in March 2019. All five surgeries were at Nicklaus Children’s Hospital. Her mother had to quit her job doing laundry in a hotel to care for her.

The worst part, according to Gloria? Being home-schooled for the rest of seventh grade.

“It was so boring!” Gloria recalled. “I can’t do anything. I can’t do something fun.”

Her absence was noted at school. Tajia Collins, a special education teacher at North Miami Middle, gifted Gloria with a blinged-out butterfly necklace after her surgeries. Collins didn’t even have Gloria as a student; she knew her because Gloria said good morning to every teacher daily.

Gloria still wears the necklace to this day.

“I got her a butterfly because a butterfly represents a new life, new beginning,” Collins said. “She’s quite the lady. She’s still resilient. She still has a great bubbly personality. She doesn’t let it get her down.”

Before Assistant Principal Edward Robinson retired, he donated a bedroom set and living room set to Gloria’s family. He called Gloria’s leadership skills and warmth “contagious in a good way.” She’s active in after-school programs geared toward mentoring and community service.

“She was just a natural leader also. I would see Gloria take control of a classroom. The kids really respected her,” Robinson said. “She did not let her disability become a setback. She wanted to be a normal child.”

Gloria still has to wear a brace for her back, even if it’s hard to wear while dancing hip-hop, but she’ll be done with that soon, too. She still has to travel to Joe DiMaggio Children’s Hospital in Hollywood for physical therapy three times a week.

Gloria would love a laptop computer to help her do her homework. She loves gadgets.

“When I was in Haiti, I never had electronics,” she says.

Her mother would love a car. She uses Lyft, the ride-sharing service, everywhere: drop-off and pickup for school, to Gloria’s therapy three times a week and for parenting classes and help at Sant La Haitian Neighborhood Center.

A car would free her up to work again and resume classes to become a nurse and learn English. Her husband, Robert, currently works in landscaping. Back in Haiti, Marie Paula worked in accounting, and Robert was a teacher.

Though life is hard, Marie Paula has a running list of people and agencies for whom she is thankful: the surgeons and staff at Nicklaus Children’s, Shriners Hospital, the physical therapists at Joe DiMaggio’s, the staff at North Miami Middle, the Community Health Clinic, Sant La, the social workers at Jackson Hospital and the Department of Children and Families.

If Gloria could give a gift, she said, she would wish for a vacation for her mother.

Wish Book is trying to help hundreds of families in need this year. To donate, pay securely at MiamiHerald.com/wishbook. For information, call 305-376-2906 or email wishbook@miamiherald.com. (The most requested items are often laptops and tablets for school, furniture, and accessible vans.) Read more at MiamiHerald.com/wishbook.