Supporting Selah
Donation protected
My cousin and her family are a few of my favorite people. If you’ve met them, you know that the Collins family is one of the best around. And if you’ve met Sarah and Drew’s 8 year old daughter, Selah, you know what a ray of sunshine she is.
Selah was born in October of 2008 with multiple internal developmental anomalies called VACTERL Association. Her first surgery, at eight hours old and just four and a half pounds, was to disconnect her esophagus from her trachea and connect it with her stomach, known as a TEF repair. Another defect, a closed nasal passage on her right side, wasn't discovered until six months old. This breathing obstruction coupled with severe reflux led to multiple choking events where Selah would turn blue and stop breathing. Drew was able to perform CPR on her each time to clear her airways and recover her breathing. Over the course of the her first nine months, Selah received six more corrective surgeries (including open heart).
Selah has been hospital-visit-free for three and a half years now, but this past Monday Selah started to not feel well. She was in and out of the doctor’s office all last week while her parents and docs tried to nail down what was going on. When antibiotics didn’t reduce her fever and other symptoms, she went back in on Friday for an ultrasound and CT scan. Doctors found an additional birth anomaly in her abdomen that had been previously undetected and that had become infected.
Selah was admitted into the hospital on Friday night and will likely be there for a few days to get IV antibiotics to clear up the infection. After the infection clears and she is feeling better, she’ll need to be readmitted for a surgery to clear up the issue.
Sarah is an artist and small business owner and Drew is a worship pastor at a local church. They are still paying off medical debt from Selah’s earliest years. This family has faced so much. I can’t imagine spending night after night in the hospital with Selah.
They would never reach out to friends and family to ask for help, but these beautiful people deserve to be loved on. Please consider contributing to help defray medical costs not covered by insurance.
I will post updates here when I get them.
Selah was born in October of 2008 with multiple internal developmental anomalies called VACTERL Association. Her first surgery, at eight hours old and just four and a half pounds, was to disconnect her esophagus from her trachea and connect it with her stomach, known as a TEF repair. Another defect, a closed nasal passage on her right side, wasn't discovered until six months old. This breathing obstruction coupled with severe reflux led to multiple choking events where Selah would turn blue and stop breathing. Drew was able to perform CPR on her each time to clear her airways and recover her breathing. Over the course of the her first nine months, Selah received six more corrective surgeries (including open heart).
Selah has been hospital-visit-free for three and a half years now, but this past Monday Selah started to not feel well. She was in and out of the doctor’s office all last week while her parents and docs tried to nail down what was going on. When antibiotics didn’t reduce her fever and other symptoms, she went back in on Friday for an ultrasound and CT scan. Doctors found an additional birth anomaly in her abdomen that had been previously undetected and that had become infected.
Selah was admitted into the hospital on Friday night and will likely be there for a few days to get IV antibiotics to clear up the infection. After the infection clears and she is feeling better, she’ll need to be readmitted for a surgery to clear up the issue.
Sarah is an artist and small business owner and Drew is a worship pastor at a local church. They are still paying off medical debt from Selah’s earliest years. This family has faced so much. I can’t imagine spending night after night in the hospital with Selah.
They would never reach out to friends and family to ask for help, but these beautiful people deserve to be loved on. Please consider contributing to help defray medical costs not covered by insurance.
I will post updates here when I get them.
Organizer and beneficiary
Jessica Johnson
Organizer
Littleton, CO
Sarah Collins
Beneficiary
