National prematurity awareness day

I recieved an email from the march of dimes today. It notified me that today was National Prematurity awareness day. It also gave an update on some statistics regarding prematurity. Like our nation recieves a grade of a D. We as a country have a higher rate of premature births than most other developed countries. Every year 1/2 a million babies are born prematurely in this country alone. Research, education, support, awareness, all things that have helped to progress the treatment and improve outcomes and survivability of countless medical tradgedies that people face. Had Evan not been born early, I may never have had the understanding of what the March of Dimes mission is, the impact they're having already, nor their goals for the future. Blogging mom's of premature infants were asked to write about this topic today to raise awareness, and so I sat down to write my post.

People who have been reading this blog, and who started with us in the begining know much of the impact of Evan being born early had on our family. You may or may not remember that at 1 1/2 days of life Evan's lungs were showing enough strength the doctors were willing to give him a try on the CPAP machine, and pulled out his ventilator tube. He did well for 1 1/2 hours, then his breathing became very labored, a lung bleed was found, and he was placed back on the ventilator. Evan was born crying, 4 times I heard his crys that sounded more like a kitten's meow, but with my son's fiest infused. He wasn't supposed to be able to do that (try to tell Evan he can't do something). None of us could breath with out a lubricating substance called surfactant. Evan was born too early for his body to know to produce it. Even though he was born crying, even though he had the ventilator to help his weak body breath, it wouldn't have mattered if the March of Dimes and research funded by them hadn't developed surfactant. He had recieved 2 doses of surfactant prior to the lung bleed. 3's the max he could get. By that evening the ventilator could not help Evan enough to breath, a nurse litterally had to stand over him with a bag blowing air into his lungs, and that was declining in its effectiveness as well. Evan's doctor told us they would try the last dose of surfactant, but that if it didn't work, .....well, we wouldn't be here today now would we. This is just one example of how the March of Dimes and the research funded by them has helped Evan. So I thank the March of Dimes for their research, for my son's life, and yes I will try to spread their message. I've created a band in Evan's honor, you can link to it by clicking on the image below. If donations are made using a mastercard they will be matched through the end of the year up to $225,000.

This is not just about premature births. The March of Dimes is fighting for healthy pregnancies, and good outcomes for all babies. They've lead the way with newborn screenings for treatable conditions that could otherwise be detrimental. They work to educate pregnant mothers how to have the healthiest pregnancy possible. If you're interested in some of the other things the March of Dimes has done over the years look at this timeline www.marchofdimes.com/789_19318.asp

I guess we all have something, battles to fight in our lives. We all have been touched in one way or another by different events that occur along our journey. When something impacts us so deeply we are moved to try to take action. We heal by trying to help others, and fight back at that which has caused us pain. HOPE for a better tomorrow is a WONDERfUL thing!