Daerra Kaye Get Well Fund

Daerra Kaye was born on December 22, 2023. Those of you that know us and have been following our journey know that shortly after her birth things did not seem well with her. After her second newborn appointment with a lactation consultant, we were advised to have her re-admitted to the hospital. Shortly after, we were in our car and headed to Lubbock, Texas where the nearest pediatric care hospital is located.

Upon arrival, doctors were flummoxed; they were certain that she was suffering from an infection of some kind, but there were also signs of other ailments. They tried, unsuccessfully, for the first couple of hours to administer an IV, but because Daerra was dehydrated they could not find a vein to put an IV in. After a few attempts and an ultrasound, doctors were able to get an IV in her forehead.

After moving from the ER to in-patient care, doctors (a whole army of them) began a battery of tests to get to the root cause of Daerra's maladies.

After MRIs, ultrasounds, CT scans, and multiple lumbar punctures doctors were able to identify that she was suffering from entero-rhino virus and bacterial meningitis. The course of treatment for meningitis is 14-21 days of antibiotics. Since she had already been in the hospital receiving antibiotics for 7 days before identifying meningitis as a culprit, the clock on her medication administration started from the day we got her in there.

This week we experienced a setback. Baby Daerra was set to be released on Saturday, January 13 at the cessation of her antibiotic course. Doctors were concerned about her not showing any signs of wanting to feed. She does not have a good suck response when the speech pathologist would work with her the stimulate her mouth to make the connection that she needs to in order to attempt to bottle feed, much less breast feed and have her feeding tube removed. They are also concerned that she is not as alert as they would like and need to conduct testing to see if her musculoskeletal system is firing on all cylinders.

The medical staff suggested that we airlift Daerra and Mama to a bigger, more advanced pediatric care facility in Dallas, Texas where they have all the equipment and resources to conduct more testing on our little girl and find the root cause of her remaining ailment.

If you have read this far, thank you for reading about our little girl. Her life thus far has not been easy, and she still has quite a road to travel before being able to come back home and be with her family where she belongs. If you are able to help us in any way possible, we truly do appreciate any and all assistance that any of you may provide.

We have no idea if this amount is sufficient enough to cover her medical bills. It could be too much, we do not know. This goal amount is subject to change as the medical bills start rolling in, I figured this is a good starting point. Whatever we are able to raise will be used for medical and travel expenses accrued during this difficult time for our family.

Please follow her more detailed story here- https://www.caringbridge.org/visit/daerrakq/journal