My nephew and niece had their firstborn baby girl, Sekoia, on 7/16, one month earlier than a normal pregnancy due to baby health conditions. She was born by emergeny c-section, as induction was not working, and was born with gastroschisis. This means she will need to have surgery if the traditional ways of getting her intestines back inside her do not work. She had to be intubated, which means put on a ventilator, when she arrived at the NICU. They have started to trial her off to see how she does, as they will need to keep her mildly sedated due to the gastroschisis. It could complicate things if she gets ahold of things with her tiny hands and the procedure is not painless. The surgeons started working on her today, 7/18, and the process of her closure is a slow and steady one as mentioned above. After they get her fully closed, they will work on her feeds, which is the hardest and longest part of the process. This process is likely to take a few months. In the meantime, dad will have to go back home, which is a few hours away, to keep things afloat and take care of the animals. He will be visiting her ans mama as much as possible.

However, as a mother of two NICU babies who spent 8 months in the NICU with Jaxon and 2 months with Mia, and all the stress and roller coaster of emotions, the thing that helped my family out was the kindness of others with donations that helped keep my family above water.

So, with that, please donate if you can and please share and also keep this gem and her family in your prayers as this long journey has just begun.