He Is My Miracle Baby And I Will Tell Anybody That
My son Joshua turned 6 years old in May against all odds. He is my miracle baby and I will tell anybody that. When I was pregnant with him and I went to find out the sex of my baby, I was told that one of his kidneys was slightly enlarged due to posterior urethral valve, which is a flap that usually dissolves away during development to allow for the free flow of urine, but it never went away and it was causing the urine to back up into his kidney and cause it to become larger. I was given the option to terminate my pregnancy or continue to monitor and see if it improved. To me, termination was not even an option. My son was already a baby boy, I couldn't even believe that was legal, but it is. As the months passed, the kidney slowly got worse and Joshua began to lose the fluid surrounding him in the womb. The doctors gave e a very grim prognosis and told me to prepare for the worst. I was going for weekly stress tests, but he always seemed to be doing ok in there despite everything.
This being my first baby, I didn't know what to do but pray for good health. According to the doctors, they didn't expect him to make it out of the delivery room. I was scheduled for C-section delivery at 39 weeks because they did not want me to go into labor with him. When I had my son, he was almost 13 lbs from all the extra fluid he had on board. He could not breathe on his own because his lungs were not able to develop due to one of his kidneys being so big. My son was on an oscillator, which is an advanced ventilator. When they tried to put him on the ventilator, it punctured his lung and they knew he couldn't handle it so they had to use an oscillator. I was told that if the oscillator didn't work, there was nothing they could have done. Thank GOD it did though. It did! He was on that for a few weeks and he had to be completely sedated so that he didn't try to breathe over the machine. Then he was placed on the ventilator. One doctor told me that she didn't ever think that he would come off the ventilator. I couldn't wrap my head around that because how could a person live and be on a ventilator. She was wrong though, my son was only on the ventilator for a few weeks too.My baby was born a fighter and nobody that seen him when he was born can even believe that he's made it as far as he has. He has had more surgeries than I can count. Multiple lines, broviac placement to reduce the IVs and blood draws, catheter placement for dialysis twice, surgery for fluid removal, transplant, ureter implantation, g- tube placement, and others I can't even think of at the moment.
This being my first baby, I didn't know what to do but pray for good health. According to the doctors, they didn't expect him to make it out of the delivery room. I was scheduled for C-section delivery at 39 weeks because they did not want me to go into labor with him. When I had my son, he was almost 13 lbs from all the extra fluid he had on board. He could not breathe on his own because his lungs were not able to develop due to one of his kidneys being so big. My son was on an oscillator, which is an advanced ventilator. When they tried to put him on the ventilator, it punctured his lung and they knew he couldn't handle it so they had to use an oscillator. I was told that if the oscillator didn't work, there was nothing they could have done. Thank GOD it did though. It did! He was on that for a few weeks and he had to be completely sedated so that he didn't try to breathe over the machine. Then he was placed on the ventilator. One doctor told me that she didn't ever think that he would come off the ventilator. I couldn't wrap my head around that because how could a person live and be on a ventilator. She was wrong though, my son was only on the ventilator for a few weeks too.My baby was born a fighter and nobody that seen him when he was born can even believe that he's made it as far as he has. He has had more surgeries than I can count. Multiple lines, broviac placement to reduce the IVs and blood draws, catheter placement for dialysis twice, surgery for fluid removal, transplant, ureter implantation, g- tube placement, and others I can't even think of at the moment.
Life after transplant of course still has its ups and downs. Transplant is a treatment, not a cure, and that is the most important thing that has stuck with me. There are still a lot of medications and blood work, still a lot of doctor appointments. The one thing that I am glad for is that my son does not have to be stuck on dialysis for 12 hours a day anymore. He is doing well, and he was actually doing really well even when he was on dialysis. He just had a very big growth spurt after his transplant, and it shocked all the doctors. It has definitely been a learning process, and there is always more to know. I can say that I have learned a lot though and I am grateful to have my wonderful son as my teacher.To read more about Joshua’s Journey click here.