Lifeguard Boat in Memory of Madison Mittelman

Max and I found out I was pregnant with our first child in January 2022 two days after my 30th birthday. I always say Madison was the best birthday gift. After two months of trying to conceive, we were ecstatic at the news of growing our family. When I was thirteen weeks pregnant in March, we discovered we were having a baby girl. As someone very close to my own mom, I couldn't wait to add another little girl to our family. I was blessed to have a completely healthy and happy pregnancy with Madison. My entire pregnancy was incredibly normal until I went to the hospital to deliver my daughter. We arrived at the hospital after my water broke in the early morning hours of September 23.

Madison Murphy Mittelman was born at 8:52am on September 24, 2022 after thirty hours of labor, four hours of pushing, and an emergency c-section. Madison was born with the umbilical cord tied around her throat three times and her torso once. She did not have a pulse when she was born. The doctors were able to bring her back after a minute of CPR. The neonatologist immediately took her to the NICU for intubation because she was not breathing on her own. Max nor I got to see or hold our daughter after she was born. We never heard that first cry parents anxiously await upon the delivery of their child. Upon coming out of the operating room, the doctors told me Madison was in extremely critical condition and could potentially die. They said she lost oxygen during labor for at least five minutes, if not longer.

As the hours progressed, we learned that Madison had a condition called HIE. HIE is a type of brain dysfunction that occurs when the brain doesn't receive enough oxygen or blood flow. About 20% of newborns with HIE pass away in the first week of life. We were fortunate that Madison was a fighter.

Madison's injuries were so severe they required her to be transferred from the hospital where I delivered her to the Intensive Care Nursery at Pennsylvania Hospital. After spending a few days at PENNSY, Max and I met with a pediatric neurologist from CHOP. She explained Madison's condition thoroughly to us after seeing the results of her MRI. She told us Madison would develop some form of cerebral palsy with the potential for severe cognitive delays. While we were saddened and scared by this news, we were fully prepared for the challenge of raising a daughter with special needs. It became an "all hands on deck" mission to get Madison home.

As the days and weeks progressed, Max, my father-in-law, and I used every resource to increase Madison's quality of life. We reached out to accomplished and published speech therapists around the country to try to help Madison develop a suck, swallow, and gag reflex. Speech time with daddy became a big part of Madison's day. While Madison started to show signs of progress in beginning to wean off oxygen and follow rhymic motions with her tongue, she began to have hypoxic episodes in her third week of life. During these episodes, her heart rate would drop to eighty, her oxygen level would fall to the sixties, and her color would turn blue. It was like watching the life getting sucked out of her body; I pray no parent ever has to witness this.

These episodes are what changed the outlook for Madison. Ultimately, Madison was trying to show us that her little body couldn't handle living anymore. After meeting with her team of doctors, they shared that Madison would never develop a quality of life. The injuries to her brain were too severe, and the damage was everywhere. Madison passed away peacefully on the morning of October 16, 2022.

While Max and I will never understand why we were dealt this terrible hand of cards in life, we are turning our tragedy into triumph to help others. Over the past week, we have started a nonprofit organization called Miracles from Madison. We are hosting our first benefit in memory of Madison on Saturday, December 17. All the proceeds from the benefit will go to the Intensive Care Nursery at Pennsylvania Hospital. While Madison's outcome was not what we had hoped for, we are incredibly grateful to everyone at the ICN for giving Madison a chance at life. We feel blessed to have had three special weeks with our first baby. We got to see her, hold her, and love her, and there aren't words to express our gratitude to her team of doctors and nurses for giving us these memories. Therefore, we would like to pay it forward to help future families at the ICN. It's a club that NO parent ever wants to join, but once you're in it, you begin to learn A LOT about the little things in life.

Madison's legacy will live on to help other babies and families at Pennsylvania hospital. However, Max and I also want her legacy to live closer to her home. As many of you may know, Max is an eighteen-year lifeguard in Longport. Longport is a special place to both Max and I. During the first summer we dated in high school, I was a beach tagger and Max was a lifeguard. A decade later, we took our engagement pictures on the beach in Longport. Another year after that, we were married at the Church of the Redeemer in Longport. Therefore, it only seems right to honor the birth of our first daughter in this town. The proceeds raised in this GoFundMe will help us purchase a lifeguard boat with Madison's name, and it will sit on the beach Max works on (35th street). It will always be "bring your daughter to work day" for Max.

This boat will provide us comfort in the years to come in being able to keep Madison close to us. It will give us the feeling that we were finally able to bring our daughter home. I look forward to standing on the beach next to this boat, with Max and our future children, knowing that our perfect guardian angel is always with us. Thank you for your kindness and generosity in helping to make our broken little family whole again. Now please have a drink after reading and surviving this incredibly long story. Cheers to our perfect angel Madison. We will always love you.