Florida Girl Gets Bionic R2-D2 Arm, Call From 'Luke Skywalker'

TALLAHASSEE (CBSMiami/CNN) - A Florida girl who was born with a nub on the end of her left arm and no fingers on her right hand is now sporting an R2-D2 bionic arm thanks to a little help from Star Wars' Luke Skywalker.

It was Isabella Tadlock's dream to be able to bend her fingers and pick things up. Born with a disability that made that challenging, she underwent multiple surgeries and now has three fingers and a thumb on her right hand.

Isabella, 11, is a huge "Star Wars" fan and when she a video of a little boy with a similar device last summer she knew she had to have one.

The Tallahassee girl's family started fundraising for the bionic arm.

Thanks to her supporters, she raised almost $14,000.

Mark Hamill, who played Luke Skywalker in the movie series, helped. He retweeted her donation link to his 3.6 million followers in November after Isabella's nanny sent the link to him, saying how big of a fan she was.

Three months after that, on February 20, Isabella and Hamill had a video call when he found out her new arm had been delivered.

"He could not have been more encouraging and kind," said Isabella's mother, Pamela Tadlock.

She showed him her new R2-D2 arm and after the two had a 30-minute conversation, he sent her passes to Disney World.

"I heard you're a 'Star Wars' fan. But I have to tell you, I'm a big fan of yours. I'm so proud of you," Hamill said in the video. "They call it a hero arm because you really are a hero."

Life with the hero arm
The makers of the "hero arm," Open Bionics, created it for that exact reason. They wanted to give children with limb differences an empowering arm. "Welcome to the future, where disabilities are superpowers," the company says on its website. They're made to pick up signals from muscles in the residual limb.

When it came time for Isabella to choose what kind she wanted, she asked for one that resembled R2-D2, Luke Skywalker's droid in the movies.

It's been only two weeks since she got the new arm, but Isabella says these have been the best days of her life.

"I am so excited. I will be able to ride my bike, swing on the monkey bars, create in the kitchen and be like my friends," Isabella said in an update on her Mightycause account.

"It's helping tremendously with her self-esteem and confidence," Tadlock said. "Just last night for the first time she was able to blow dry her hair by herself."

The strong-willed "Star Wars" fan has faced several obstacles in her young life, but her family has been there every step of the way. And her six siblings have treated her no differently, Tadlock said.

And now she has a new dream: to be a bionic arm model.

(©2020 CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved. Cable News Network, Inc., a Time Warner Company, contributed to this report.)