Catherine, little Johnny and I want to thank everyone from the bottom of our hearts for the overwhelming love and support we have received over this last year.

We are so fortunate to have the family and friends we have in our lives. We love you all so very much. There are simply no words to express how much we appreciate each and every one of you. It absolutely got our new little family through the hardest of times.

We wanted to explain the events that took place on the most scary but wonderful day of our lives - the day our beautiful little Johnny Boy became part of this world!!! We are also writing this as a Go Fund Me for our beautiful little man!!

After many years of trying naturally to conceive Catherine and I finally decided to use IVF. My champ of a wife underwent two rounds of treatment and then finally god answered our prayers and we had our miracle baby!!

Throughout our pregnancy our little man was growing very big and strong. He was in the 69% percentile and expected to be a very big baby!! We were over the moon with excitement!!

It began by not feeling him kick as much and we immediately rushed to silver cross hospital where they confirmed a dip in his heartbeat and that he was wrapped around his umbilical cord. We had two options: either have him now or take the risks of what could happen letting him go full-term.

We were so scared but a choice had to be made and we decided to welcome him to the world! It was the best move of our lives!!

Johnny Jason Jensen was born May 29th at 7:34am weighing just shy of two pounds. He went on to have two surgeries.

One was for a PDA (Patent Ductus Arteriosus) which is an open vessel in his heart. The second surgery was a stint in his arterial vein which was thin due to his prematurity. This allowed the correct amount of blood flow and oxygen to go from his heart to his lungs. Both surgeries were a success and our little fighter was a champ for both.

Our little guy was also born with a floppy airway and underdeveloped lungs so he temporarily had to have a breathing tube. Our little fighter never let this stop him and he progressed beyond anyone's wildest thoughts.

We desperately tried all we could to avoid him having a tracheotomy but we knew it was the best choice for him and would remove his breathing tube.

He was so close to not needing this but until his floppy airway became strong enough this would help him to breathe. We are in hopes this will be a short lived tracheotomy and believe this June we will know how much longer he will have this. We are told this can take over a year unfortunately but we are determined to get our family through this tough time.

Little Johnny began his journey at Silver Cross Hospital however we soon moved him to Lurie's Children Hospital permanently. Again this was our best choice for little Johnny.

From September 2023 until April 2024 we spent every single moment we could with our little man. We would drive downtown and stay for 4 nights at a time in the sleep rooms actually within Lurie's Hospital. We came home for a couple days and then would go right back. It was not ideal and very difficult for us but we would do anything for Johnny!

During this time is when my wife lost her job after 8 years working as a paralegal and I found myself being released from my position as a low voltage technician. We were beyond devastated but knew we would never stopped caring for Johnny and continuing our fight for him and to get back to work.

While I constantly interviewed with any company looking for a new hire Catherine and I spent every holiday with our little man and even had a Christmas tree lit up in his room with all his presents!! For Halloween he was Winnie the Pooh and he was the absolute favorite and most loved kid on his hospital floor. Every nurse was always so excited to see our little guy and help us learn all we would need to care for him at home.

The day finally came where little Johnny was cleared to come home and we could not have been more excited!!!

He is the absolute best baby you could ever dream of!! He is always smiling and happy! He sleeps through the entire night and loves being around people. He is so very intelligent and we cannot wait till this is all behind him and our family.

We are so grateful for all of our family and friends who have shown support over this last year and we wanted to really explain how hard this has been on our new little family and what we have gone through.

We also wanted to express how much we are nervous for the next year ahead and for all of little Johnny’s expected upcoming medical bills. We so far have accrued over hundreds of thousands of dollars. We are not sure how we will navigate through this and are asking for your help. We appreciate you all from the bottom of our hearts. God bless you and god bless little Johnny!