A little piece of heaven

This is from Owen:

I want to thank everyone for keeping us in your thoughts and prayers as it’s been truly a rough month and a half for us.

It was quite a emotional roller coaster as we spent 2-3 hours before the cesarean deliberating with doctors over the resuscitation limits, and his post death procedures. There were about 12 people in the operating room with another 2 on emergency standby. After Nathan’s birth, the Perinatologist left to tell our families the good news and had to ‘fudge’ the apgar score as the Neonatologist and others were so surprised that he came out healthy and breathing they didn’t even stop to weigh him until requested by us.

Even after three days of testing Nathan along with many vials of blood drawn for a further bombardments of tests, he came out to be in perfectly normal health. After an ultrasound, the head neonatology at UCLA told us that his condition will only need extra stimuli throughout his first few years, and with extra care he will most likely turn out to living a long and normal life.

For those that play Warhammer, I thought I’d throw out the statistics on this “miracle baby” Correct me if I’m wrong:

– His condition is about 1 : 20,000 out of every birth. (0.00005)
– 1 : 200 make it through full term pregnancy alive. (0.005)
– less than 2% of those survive through the trauma of birth to their first breath. (0.02)
– less than 1% of those that survive come out without health complication which will allow them to live during their short hospital stay. (0.01)

Total odds = (0.00000000005) or 1 : 20,000,000,000 chance

Just for reference, California lottery Match 5 Plus Mega (Jackpot Win!) Odds = 1:41,416,353

When people ask us why the doctors put us through the trauma of telling us he would not survive for those 2 months, it’s only from statistics that they base their ascensions, even though miracles do happen.

Again, thank everyone for keeping us in your thoughts and prayers as Nathan Dorje Andrew is a happy, 7lb. 9oz., 20inch completely well spoiled baby.

Owen Andrew

I can’t begin to tell you how joyful I am to be online today, thanking you for the miracle you made happen. Baby Dorje is alive, he’s a beautiful, healthy baby boy, who completely beat all the odds. I have no doubt it was solely due to prayers that this baby is home today. So we thank you from the bottom of our hearts for this life you have helped to bring to this world.

So here’s the story.

We got to the hospital on Monday, and about 2 hours before the surgery was scheduled, one of the doctors came to us to ask about death rituals and how much resuscitation we wanted. He told us that as the baby had less than 10% chance of survival, we had to be prepared.

Regardless of this, we stayed strong and I went to the operating room with a hopeful heart. Everything depended on how Nathan reacted as soon as he came out of the womb. The doctors didn’t expect him to be able to breathe on his own, or to have normal functions.

So you can imagine my joy when I heard Owen say, “Oh my God, there’s his head!”…and seconds later…WAHHHHHHHHHHH. I don’t know who was crying louder, Nathan, Owen or me.

Everything baby Dorje has done so far has surpassed all expectations. One of the doctors at UCLA came to us yesterday and said, “You do realize that only 3% of these babies survive the transition from the womb to the world.” And even after they survive, they are not expected to be able to do other things, such as feed, regulate their temperature, etc.

Nathan has passed every single test so far with flying colors, including his vision, hearing, and lots of other blood tests. He feeds like a champ, knew how to suckle from the first moment he was given to me, and has had no health problems at all so far.

He is, however, still diagnosed with developmental problems in his brain….Where the brain should’ve split into 2 hemispheres, it only partially formed, so some structures are missing and he is expected to have developmental delays.

However, with everything he’s done so far, we wouldn’t be shocked if he surprised us in this regard too!

The doctors believe that with lots of stimuli, physical therapy and early intervention, Nathan can have a normal life with an adult life span. He has done so well that now they’re expecting surprises. What’s unbelievable is that the initial prognosis was that, even if he survived, they didn’t expect him to be able to do things like walk or talk.

We have a lot of work ahead of us. Already we have contacted the Regional Center and have started the process of getting a team of doctors ready to help treat Nathan. We were told by the neonatologist and by a neurologist that the sooner we interfere and start stimulating the development of his brain, the better his chances will be.

Although the doctors call it a surprise…I call it a miracle, the result of amazing people with good hearts who have been praying for him and sending him so much love.

I wish I could thank each of you personally, hug you, and tell you how much your prayers and support have meant. Since I can’t, I ask you to imagine a big hug from all 3 of us: Owen, Nathan and Marcela.

This precious little boy wouldn’t be in this world if it weren’t for your prayers and support – THANK YOU.

Well it’s been 2 weeks and fortunately we have more good news. We had our first appointment with the opthalmologist, and she was delighted to find Nathan’s vision intact. She examined his eyes, dilated his pupils, and found his retina and other eye structures functioning well.

She needs to continue checking him to determine if malformations in his brain will affect his vision, as sometimes the eye is perfect but the brain can’t interpret the information. However, she is hopeful and seems to think everything works well for now, so she encouraged us and told us to hope for the best.

Other than that, we are just taking things a day at a time. For now he is a normal baby, and we are learning how to take care of him and what works for him.

We had an interesting experience with him the other day. We were driving home, and there was an accident on the freeway that had just happened. A car was on fire, and there were a couple of people on the ground on the freeway who were obviously injured. Nathan was sleeping in the car, but when we arrived near the accident scene, he woke up and started screaming. We couldn’t get him to calm down, he just cried and cried for quite a long time after.

We think maybe he perceived the energy of the accident. We had never seen him cry that intensely, and he was inconsolable.

As the days go by we are realizing he is a very very sensitive person, he picks up people’s energies very clearly and it affects him.

On another note, we are going to start with a child development therapist next week, someone is going to come twice per week to work with him. We are very excited.

Thank you for your continued prayers and for continuing to be involved in Nathan’s life.