So, some of you may know my recent story but I will tell it again to say thank you. Recently, my life changed forever. My wife who was 31 weeks pregnant went around midnight to the Emergency Room because she hadn’t felt the baby move for a while and wanted to get reassurance that the baby was okay because of our recent history of miscarriages. My wife was admitted to the Labor and Delivery floor for observation, and I received a frantic call from her at 7:45 am that she will be having an Emergency C-section due to not finding a heartbeat. My wife was taken back to surgery, and my son was born shortly after at 8:00 am at 3 pounds 4 ounces with no heartbeat. A code was called and after 10-15 minutes the doctors, nurses, and team were able to restart his heart and bring him back to life. My wife lost over 3.5 pints of blood and was not doing well herself but was able to pull through.

After a tense couple of hours, my son was transferred to the NICU in Columbus and spent the next 49 days fighting for his life, trying to gain weight and keep his feeds down. He was then transferred to Egleston for evaluation due to him being a candidate for a fundoplication and to have a g-tube placed. After 23 days at Egleston, I am happy to announce that he has met all of the doctors’ goals and will be discharged. Although the hurdle of getting out of the NICU is hopefully over, our journey has just begun. His team of doctors and therapists feel he is showing the early signs of cerebral palsy. So we will continue to work with him to make him the least limited as possible.

I want to say thank you to all the Nurses, Doctors, Respiratory Therapists, Pharmacists, EVS, and Dietary workers that we encountered during our stay at West Georgia, they were a shining example of compassionate care and professionalism. I want to specifically say thank you to Dr. Trench-Simmons, Dr. Butzon, Dr. Bowie, Shannon Prophett, Sun Mee Kim, Mark Baker, Kenzie Elliston, Bebe Nelson, Angela McSpadden, Lisa Connell, Angela Hammond, LaRhonda Bailey, Andrea Garner, Dariene Scott, Tami Conti, and Mary Lois Calhoun. Mary Lois and Angela Hammond were our calm in a time of complete fear for both my wife and me. I can’t thank enough the countless others in the hospital and throughout the community who have kept us in their thoughts and prayers during this trying time. I just want everyone to know that although sometimes as healthcare workers we forget that each of you as leaders and staff makes a difference in someone’s life and you certainly have made a difference in my life.