Premature Baby Born at 23 Weeks Could Have Been Legally Aborted, But He’s Heading Home
A baby born at 23 weeks gestation weighing just 719g went home after 184 days in hospital.
After Courtney and her husband Rhys tragically lost their baby, Savannah Jane, born at nearly 19 weeks gestation, doctors decided to protect Courtney’s second pregnancy by placing a cervical stitch to help prevent premature birth.
It seems to be working and regular ultrasounds indicate that everything is going as it should. However, while Courtney was out celebrating what was supposed to be her first day of maternity leave with her friends, she started experiencing heavy bleeding.
“[My friend] said to me, ‘Courtney look at your foot, it’s red!’. The ambulance was called and I was immediately rushed to the emergency room”, Courtney said.
“The needle failed and I’m in labor. I dilated three centimeters. The membrane of her amniotic sac started to come in, which caused the bleeding”.
“They stopped my work six times […] Then in the early hours of a Tuesday morning at 3:00am I went into labor again and again they tried to stop it. But by 5:00am that morning, it came in hard and fast”.
Maverick was born before the UK abortion limit at 23 weeks and five days
“There was so much happiness around, but at the same time so much worry and concern”, dad Rhys recalled.
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Because he was born early, baby Maverick has many problems. At seven days old he had to have surgery for a perforated stomach and just over a week later, his kidneys and lungs began to fail.
His mom and dad went home at night but the hospital woke them up to call to inform them of their son’s serious condition.
“They said you have to go to the hospital now, ‘Can you be here in 20 minutes?’. I told them we live 40 minutes away. And they said they didn’t think he would make it” Courtney said.
“It’s gradually getting worse. They called to say, ‘We need to increase his oxygen percentage.’ He went up to 40 percent of the oxygen requirement, and then 50 percent”.
“If it will save his life, let’s do it”
However, Maverick continued to get worse, and his medical team decided to put him on nitric gas, something that is not usually given to babies under 34 weeks. “It can have many dangerous side effects Courtney explains “like brain damage and intellectual damage”.
“We weighed the options and thought if it’s going to save his life, let’s do it”.
The next 48 hours seemed like an eternity but the little fighter made it out the other end and after 184 days in the hospital, he was home.
“He is meeting all his developmental milestones. He says two words – mama and hi. Mama is his favorite to drop when he’s sad”, Courtney joked.
Right To Life UK spokeswoman, Catherine Robinson, said “These stories seem to happen all the time. With dedicated medical teams, these tiny babies are doing better than ever “.
LifeNews Note: Republished with permission from Right to Life UK.
