Noah, born 2010

Noah was our ray of sunshine after a very difficult storm. In July of 2009 his brother was stillborn and just a few short months later we found out that we were expecting again. When he was born Noah was the picture of health, chubby, happy, a good sleeper, he hardly ever fussed. The day after we brought him home from the hospital he started to look a little orange. We took him back in for some tests, which confirmed that he had jaundice. He was put under the bili lights for 24 hours and sent home. Another control test the following day confirmed that he had jaundice again. His levels would go down while he was under the lights but would increase as soon as we took him off. I was sleeping over at the hospital in a room down the hall from the nursery and one morning on his 12th day of life I arrived at the nursery to Noah surrounded by doctors and nurses. A nurse informed me that while I was sleeping they had done a chest x-ray and discovered that Noah's heart was enlarged. Further tests showed that he had no femoral pulses and his blood pressure was through the roof. He was immediately transferred to the ICU of the local children's hospital where he was placed on life support while awaiting his surgery. At 14 days old he underwent surgery to repair his coarctation of the aorta. Five days later he was home and as good as new. Less than 3 months later a standard check-up alerted us to a new narrowing. This time Noah had a catheterization and was home within 48 hours of the procedure. He is now a healthy, happy and extremely active 18 month old. He takes Captopril to control his blood pressure for the time being but we are hopeful that he will be able to wean off of it in the near future.

 

Story by Noah’s mom, Sandra – Quebec Canada